Detritus

Detritus is a noun that refers to debris or discarded items. Our word of the day comes directly from Latin. After being imported into English in the late 18th century, its pronunciation has shifted from dee TREE toose to its English equivalent de TRY tus, but it has retained the same meaning of ‘waste or discarded material.’ When we changed offices, some people came to think of all those photos on the break room wall as detritus. But I understood they were more than items to be discarded. They were memories of lifelong friendships.