BITS & PIECES OF A MISPLACED LIFE: WORDS, WORDS, WORDS

"My vocabulary loosened up during my freshman year
at Berkeley, and I was quite pleased when my mother
remarked that the more educated I got the more I
sounded like a truck driver."
                                Pauline Kael
The New Yorker, October 18, 1969
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CECIL B. DEMILLE MADE THE MOVIE - THE SQUAW WOMAN
"Of the words borrowed from the Indian squaw has not 
fared has not fared so well, although it began without prejudice. In various Algonquian Indian languages, it 
could be translated as 'woman,' 'young woman,' Queen,
'or 'Lady.' In the English of New England, as early 
as 1622, squaw was used as a modifier in the phrase 
squa sachim, meaning an Indian ruler who was a woman. 
By 1634, English speakers were using squawk to refer 
to any Indian Woman..."

David K. Barnhart and Allan A. Metcalf. America In So Many Words: Words That Have Shaped America {New York: Houghton
 Miffln Company, 1997)
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If the  novelist Carolyn See had been able to spot 
George Bernard Shaw walking past a children's playground 
on a beach, the following sentences could be written:

See saw sea see-saws.  "See Shaw see sea see-saws," 
See said.
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A BIT ABOUT COD

"In the English-speaking West Indies, salt fish is the common name for salt cod. In slang, salt fish means 'a woman's genitals,' and while Caribbeans do love their salt cod, it is this other meaning that is responsible for the frequent appearance of the word saltfish in Caribbean songs such as the Mighty Sparrow's 'Saltfish.'

Mark Kurlansky. COD (New York: Penguin Books, 1997)

To see & hear the lyrics to SALTFISH, go to:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ER-tjMwODM
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ON THE NAME CARIBBEAN

Caribbean (adj.)
"of or pertaining to the Caribs," also "of the sea 
between the West Indies and the South American mainland,"
 by 1750s, from Carib, indigenous people's name for 
themselves, + -ean.

Carib (n.)
"one of a native people of Central America and northern South America and formerly of the Caribbean," 1550s, from Spanish Caribe, from Arawakan (West Indies) kalingo, karina, or kalino, said to mean "brave ones" or else "strong men." As an adjective by 1881.

from the ONLINE ETMOLOGICAL DICTIONARY
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Robert Scotto sent me the following quotation
 from Manhattan Beach: A Novel by Jennifer Egan
	
"So much speech is derived from the sea, from “keeled over” to “learning the ropes” to “catching the drift” to “freeloader” to “gripe” to “brace up” to “taken aback” to “leeway” to “low profile” to “the bitter end,” or the very last link on a chain.
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DOROTHY PARKER AT THE DINNER TABLE

"And when the table gossip turned to an actress who 
had fallen and broken a leg in London, Mrs. Parker 
seemed distraught: "Oh, how horrible," she muttered
 to her neighbor at the table. "She must have done 
it sliding down a barrister."

John Keats. The Life and Times of Dorothy Parker: 
You Might As Well Live (New York: Simon & Schuster ,1970)
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EIGHTY-SIX

"It comes from 1930s soda-counter slang meaning that 
an item was sold out. Eighty-six is slang meaning 
"to throw out," "to get rid of," or "to refuse service
 to." It comes from 1930s soda-counter slang meaning 
that an item was sold out." It has been suggested 
that the phrase may have originated as rhyming slang 
for NIX (meaning to cancel).

"Get the hell out of here!" he roared. "You're eighty-six'd, you hear me! Get out! And don't come back."

from Fooling Houdini by Alex North (New York, HarpetCollins, 2012)
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THE FILM "LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP"(l943)-- 
THE USE OF THE TERM "CONCENTRATION CAMP

"Clive Candy goes to Germany to fight a duel over propaganda about the British treatment of people in South Africa in the Boer War. Many of the cited things he was dueling over were, in fact, true. "Concentration camp" was first used to describe British camps in South Africa in 1899-1902."

iDMb Trivia - THE FILM "LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL 
BLIMP"(l943)--
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ON THE IDEA OF KISMET
"Kismet first entered the English language in 1834, but it wasn’t popularized until 1876, as the title of a book. Kismet is a Victorian novel by George Fleming, the pseudonym of American writer Julia Constance Fletcher. She had learned about the concept of kismet when she visited Egypt, and noveled around it, her tale centering on a group of white travelers falling in and out of love, floating down the Nile in their dahabeahs. The book is an ode to the mysterious workings of the heart, to the surprising antilogic of destiny. 
Kismet is given credit for bringing my parents together. When I think about it now, as an adult, I find it difficult to believe. But they insist it is the truth. It is a fact that my mother saw my father for the first time across a crowded cafeteria, that she froze, pointed, and said to her friend: “It’s him.” Never mind that she didn’t know who he was, that she had sworn off men, that he was definitely younger than she. She felt a flash of recognition at the sight of him, and this could not be ignored. She told her friend she would marry this man, whoever he was."
Word: Kismet by Hilal Isler in THE BELIEVER (SUMMER 2023)

Kismet is a musical adapted by Charles Lederer and Luther Davis from the 1911 play of the same name by Edward Knoblock, with lyrics and musical adaptation by Robert Wright and George Forrest. The music was mostly adapted from several pieces composed by Alexander Borodin. 
Wikipedia

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IN MEDIA RES

Let me start in the middle of things.
Why not,
We are always in the middle of things.

Were you in the middle of something?
I don’t mean
To interrupt. Continue with something

To do, but no matter what you do
There is more
To be done. What else can we do,

Running from one chore to another?
You, amid
Some intimate drama or another

While I try to hold your attention
For a few minutes.,
Pause, Now a let-down of attention

Until the pipes & timbrels of time
Call us away,
Suspended as we are for a brief time

Between the beginning & the end,

Louis Phillips



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