Wordcatcher (47 page)

Creation of offspring with different characteristics than their parents’.
Technically,
xenogenesis
is defined as “the supposed production of offspring markedly different from either parent,” according to
The American Heritage Dictionary
. Sometimes it’s distinguished from
metagenesis
, altered generation, or
abiogenesis
, spontaneous generation. Figuratively, it describes a certain fear and terror about the identity of your offspring, your own kids, as in, Are they really ours, honey? Are you sure they weren’t switched in the hospital nursery? The feeling arises at the age—teens—when your kids just seem
alien
to you (and you to them, by the way); this is just the word to describe that
weirdness
. But the technical definition doesn’t begin to capture the
otherness
of the situation. Better to evoke Sigourney Weaver’s cry of surprise and horror in
Alien
when the creature leaps out of the chest of one of her crew.
Xenogenesis
or not, we still
love
’em, right?

Admiration for, attraction to, or outright love for unknown, even strange, objects, peculiar experiences, or exotic people
. Often, we remember negative words because of their
sonicky
power, words such as
xenophobia
, “fear or suspicion of strangers.” Not often enough do we explore their opposites, such as this obscure but still valuable word, from
xeno
s, unknown or foreign, and
philos
,
love
or affection. This word could help you describe someone’s otherwise indescribable compulsive collecting, let’s say, or Joseph Cornell’s lifelong search for the oddments he placed in his shadow boxes, or Peter the Great’s secretive
travels
around Europe in search of the exotic for his Curiosity Cabinets. My 13-year-old son, Jack, reminds me of a character named Xenophilius Lovegood, in
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
, who is known for his peculiar interest in “unusual or unknown objects, animals, and concepts.” Companion words include the even more intense
philoxenia
, the ancient belief that a stranger who knocks on your door might be a god or goddess in disguise, a motif explored in such beloved myths as the story of Philemon and Baucis. This core belief persisted through the centuries in Greece, producing one of the most hospitable cultures in the world. When I went to Athens for the 2004 Olympics I was hosted by a series of Greek friends—and total strangers—who took me in because I’d written a book about their country. One of them, George Tsakorias, explained, “Why am I hosting you? Because I am Greek and I believe, like my ancestors, in
xenophilia
.”

To tremble with desire, be filled with longing.
More than the vaporous
wishing
and less literal than the possessive
wanting
,
yearning
goes to the bone. Since its origins in the 11th-century Old English
geoman
and Middle English
yemen,
German
geron
, desire, it has meant “a strong, often
melancholic
desire, a persistent and wistful longing,” tinged with something missing in sheer longing—namely, deep pity, sympathy, as in the
yearning
for your child to make it safely home from school, or for the shooting to stop in the war-torn inner city. All these influences go into understanding the depth of Stephen Jay Gould’s reflection, “We are glorious accidents of an unpredictable process with no drive to complexity, not the expected results of evolutionary principles that yearn to produce a creature capable of understanding the mode of its own necessary construction.” As usual, Goethe’s commentary is hard to improve upon: “I love those who
yearn
for the impossible.”

Any contract that forbids employees to join a union.
This cute and colorful term belies the red-faced American labor disputes that date back to the mid-19th century. The phrase
yellow dog
first surfaces in the spring of 1921 during a time when editorials began appearing, especially in the labor presses. Exemplary of the stance and of the folk etymology of the term is this excerpt from an editorial in the
United Mine Workers
newsletter: “This agreement has been well named. It is
yellow dog
for sure. It reduces to the level of a
yellow dog
any man that signs it, for he signs away every right he possesses under the Constitution and laws of the land and makes himself the truckling, helpless slave of the employer.” According to the
Dictionary of Color
, yellow is symbolic because “If someone is
yellow
it means they are a coward, so yellow can have a negative meaning in some cultures. Yellow is for mourning in Egypt, and actors of the Middle Ages wore yellow to signify the dead. Yet yellow has also represented courage (Japan), merchants (India), and peace.” A yellow ribbon stands for hope, as we saw with the mothers of soldiers stationed in Iraq; “mellow yellow” was the singer Donovan’s way of saying laid-back; “yellow-bellied sapsucker,” a species of bird, was an insult in Ireland;
yellow journalism
, reportage that is biased and sensationalized, was practiced by Hearst. “Y’er
yellah
” was one of the worst insults imaginable in the old John Ford Westerns. And here’s why the Simpsons characters were drawn
yellow
—to catch the eye of channel-surfers.

Sort of youthful; not quite adulty.
Samuel Pepys preferred
youthsome
, but
youthy
is an actual word, not from Stephen Colbert, but from the great Scot James Halliwell, who included it in his word list from 1611. This corner believes it is a MNW (much needed word), if not an indispensable word, because it captures in a catchy way the essence of the obsession with staying young at all costs or worshipping at the altar of youth. Epitomizing this phenomenon are Hollywood, Paris, and Monaco, among other places, where naturally aging people do unnatural things to themselves in an attempt to appear younger than they are. Compare this monomaniacal behavior to the philosophy championed by the immortal Satchel Paige, who once said: “How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you were?” Companion words obsessed with youth include
youth culture
,
youth-oriented
, and
fountain of youth
. Of the concern with youthfulness, Mae West said, “You’re never too old to become younger,” and the youthsome Oscar Wilde uttered, “An inordinate passion for pleasure is the secret of remaining young.” At least he didn’t say
youthy
.

Cuban street slang for “foreigner,” especially those from Europe or North America.
The word was all the vogue for young Cubans after Castro’s coup in 1959, and was spontaneously revived after the 1980s surge of asylum-seeking abroad. In
the expression “I want to go to
La Yuma
” it became shorthand for “Stateside.” To this day, it’s a word or phrase relatively unknown in Mexico or Spain, and despite the fact that few Cubans would be able to locate Yuma on a map, it remains popular. The folk etymology traces it back to the 1957 movie version of Elmore Leonard’s short story,
3:10 to Yuma,
which mythologized “cowboy honor.” To Cubans, the flick became the Hollywood equivalent of a “cherriedout” ‘63 Impala or the innumerable cowboy dime novels seen around Cuba, which have become emblematic of “honor and obligation.” In the movie, a struggling rancher agrees, for the price of a bounty, to take a captured outlaw into custody until the train arrives that will take him to court in
Yuma
, Arizona. While they wait, the outlaw tries to sway the rancher to let him escape. What was in the movie that caught the Cubans’ attention and affection? When I viewed the 2007 remake, the lines leapt out at me. The rancher, Dan Evans (Van Heflin/Christian Bale), is stupefied that the outlaw, Ben Wade (Glenn Ford/Russell Crowe), rescued him when he could’ve escaped: Evans: “Why did you do it, Ben?” Wade: “I don’t like owing anybody any favors. You saved my life back at the hotel. That’s all right, I’ve broken out of Yuma before.”
3:10 to Yuma
is a cry for freedom.