Thing Not To Be Today: a delinquent.

Delinquent is such a lovely word. It should mean trailing the scent of lily-of-the-valley, or making a sound like a small brook, or tasting faintly of gooseberries.

Sadly, delinquent describes someone who is repeatedly guilty of minor offences or misdeeds such as breaking windows, shop-lifting, or making something even uglier by spray-painting it.

A delinquent is more or less always a youthful person (though there are delinquent shoe-eating dogs and delinquent fence-destroying horses) so any chance of delinquency is long gone for me.

Which really makes me feel quite wistful.

Thing Not To Be Today: delinquent. This word came from the Latin dēlinquēns, which means offending. Linquere means to forsake.