May I have a word with you?

I don't realize that I've been missing words until they pop up again. The other day I heard a big brother (an ex-student) call his little brother (a current student) a clown. "You're a real clown," he said. And I smiled more about his word choice than the fact that the little brother and I had just played a good trick on the big one.

There are also words I miss because I refuse to use them. Words like 'chat'. It was probably archaic when I used it, but I liked it. Thanks for the chat, let's chat soon and there's nothing like a good chat all referred to real conversations. Many current users probably have no idea that you can chat in person. If I accidently use the word, they think I'm involved in an internet relationship.

I've lived in Italy so long that my vocabulary lacks lots of the latest lingo. I pick up a few words from my cool students that learn them on Instagram and Netflix. They're easy to memorize, but I'm never sure how to throw OG (old gangster) into a sentence. And the other day when I accepted a student's invitation with, 'I'm in' he corrected me with 'I'm down'. I used to say 'I'm down with that' in the 90s; 'I'm down' must be the new abbreviation. But now that I think about it, after saying 'I'm in' it's probably the perfect time to add, 'I use that term because I'm OG.'

Sometimes English words pop up Italianized. Years ago there was lots of talk about 'the Joe Backed'. I always wondered who Joe was and I didn't understand why he deserved an article in front of his name. I finally asked and here's the reply. "You don't know WHAT the Joe Backed is?" (That should have been my first clue, WHAT instead of WHO.) He continued, "I throw an American term in an Italian sentence and that's the only word you don't understand?" When he said that politicians say it every day I realized that 'the Joe Backed' was the Italian pronunciation of 'the Job Act'.

The other day someone referred to their 'coperta di LEE-noose'. That's not the right spelling but I wanted you to hear how it's pronounced. Coperta is blanket. Lino (pronounced LEE-no) is linen. I thought they were talking about a linen blanket. Weeks later I saw it written. The coperta di Linus is Linus' blanket, aka security blanket. I'm afraid my mini-Oxford Dictionary isn't the Linus' blanket it used to be. I'm sure I wouldn't have found that if I'd looked under 'L'.

I've been told by American friends that I suffer from the 'FOMO'. I don't think that's how to use it in a sentence, but I know it means 'fear of missing out.' I don't know if you suffer from the 'FOMO' or if you are a 'FOMO'. But that sounds like 'MOFO', which I've yet to understand why it's not 'MOFU' since that's the correct abbreviation of THOSE two words.

It's time to stop clowning around and get back to serious things like stoking fires; in the water heater for hot water, in the fireplace for a warm livingroom and in the stove to cook my dinner. And even though those are the most important events of the day at the mountain house, I don't (often) suffer from the FOMO. It's a place where I feel like a tough MOFO and a real OG.