Toronto Star

I have the write word for you

- HEATHER MALLICK HEATHER MALLICK IS A TORONTOBAS­ED COLUMNIST COVERING CURRENT AFFAIRS FOR THE STAR. FOLLOW HER ON TWITTER: @HEATHERMAL­LICK

CBC.ca, eager to keep what it presumably sees as its foolish online audience up to date, neither embarrassi­ng themselves in public nor blaming the CBC for having taken them downmarket, has suggested a list of “words and phrases you might want to think twice before using.”

It made this writer laugh. Thinking twice and sometimes 7.5 times before using words and phrases is how I earn my coin. And even then at 4 a.m. I thrash like a gaffed salmon on the pillow at an ill-chosen phrase.

Some are obvious. But despite the CBC’s assumption, no Torontonia­n would use the American “ghetto” or “inner city” anyway since underservi­ced areas tend to be semi-suburban, easy to ignore, easy to undervacci­nate and underschoo­l. I say “poorer neighbourh­oods.” It’s accurate and makes the problem sound fixable, which it is. Spend the money.

Anti-racism trainer Jas Kalra told the CBC he objects to “first-world problem” as “classist.” “When we say first-world, we’re putting them at the top.”

But “first world” is self-deprecatin­g. I wish there were more of it. My first-world problems are the small stained rubber tray beneath all other world problems, and yet still they madden me.

A West Elm curtain rod across the back of the house suffered metal fatigue and collapsed on my head one morning. I think heavy metal gear should last longer than two years. West Elm disagreed. I could soap the windows white or paste brown paper, I guess. Or I could buy new cheap rods from Pottery Barn.

It’s owned by a puzzling U.S. company that caters to all failings: Williams-Sonoma and West Elm for aspiration­als, Rejuvenati­on for trad West Elmers, Pottery Barn for shaggy people who like their lamp bases hefty (me). Most have a cheaper kids section, which is where we pandemic people shop.

The whole concept is a first-world problem. Their goods don’t offer grand problems, just serried dissatisfa­ction.

We obviously no longer say “gypsy,” instead using “Roma.” So I’m happy to discard “gypsy moth” but language objectors don’t do the hard work, which is offering alternativ­es. My research says I should refer to such moths as “Lymantria dispar dispar” but it sounds like a facial fungus and will be slow to catch on.

I will stick with “brainstorm,” “blindsided” (I am, frequently) and “blind spot” (a poor driver). Dostoyevsk­y’s epilepsy was referred to as “the falling sickness,” very different from brainstorm­ing meetings where the ideas are derisory, derivative and a waste of time.

I will not replace “tone-deaf” with “musically disincline­d.” Being deaf is literal; being “tone-deaf” is social. Beethoven was deaf; Erin O’Toole is tone-deaf. It’s different.

We should not say “sold down the river” or “grandfathe­red in,” terms derived from American slavery. But I’ll stick with tactile words like “blackmail” and “black sheep” until someone comes up with better ones. Because that’s the trick: finding new terminolog­y. I have always been “redatt,” courtesy of Stephen Fry’s favourite philologis­t, Dr. Donald Trefusis. It’s the Papuan term for those “unlikely to take part in evening games.” I decline charades and cards but can be talked into Twister. Redatt. Use it in good health.

John Koenig, author of “The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows,” has found fresh words for our obscure states of mind. “Midding” means “feeling the tranquil pleasure of being near a gathering but not quite in it, chatting outside a party while others dance inside.” Clearly he means “redatt” but I shan’t tread on his glory.

Most will look forward to Koenig’s “etterath,” the feeling of emptiness after a long and arduous process (like surgery) is finally complete. This is the sensation that may follow the end of the pandemic, “relieved that it’s over but missing the stress that organized your life into a mission.”

You may go glassy-eyed with etterath. I shall be out getting bladdered, champagnin­g in the park with comrades, non-redatt, ebullient, veering on hooligan-like in my joy.

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