They say the city speaks a hundred languages. Spanish, Chinese, Russian, and Creole decorate subway ads, the linguistic U.N. Security Council. The General Assembly includes an apartment building in the outer boroughs that houses more speakers of a dying Himalayan tongue than still live back in the Himalayas. But the total number of languages is far greater, for every family, whether it be a couple or a clan, has its private lingo — phrases that signal moods or attitudes, words bearing non-Merriam-Webster definitions. Sometimes these escape into general usage. The Mitfords bequeathed to England and to Anglophiles an interwar upper-class lingo (U, do admit). The Kennedys named their cluster of seaside homes a compound. (Why? That sounds like a section of a stalag.) But most such usages lead private lives. Overhear a few of ours.
Mister — you understand this? When one of us has missed a joke. The late 20th-century comic who deployed this line at his live shows would aim it at a laughing audience member in the front row (of course the victim had understood whatever preceded it, the whole house would be rocking), then add insult to insult by turning away in disgust at his supposed obtuseness: Nazi bastard! (A punch line which has outlived its time since the proliferation of Nazi bastards.) Another line we have borrowed mocks uncomprehending others. You know — morons. First addressed, on the big screen, by a doper friend to the new sheriff in town (black) after he has tried in vain to sweet-talk the townsfolk (white). What had he expected? They were [insert line]. NB: the original delivery of this joke was one of the great line readings in all of cinema. It also indirectly elected Donald Trump.
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