fall back
v. phr.— «“He was in fact a member of the Bloods street gang,” said Taylor. “This is no longer true.” Taylor said there was a tape-recorded conversation between Taylor and a confidential informant in which Taylor said he was “falling back from the Bloods, a term meaning he’s trying to leave the gang life.”» —“Former Bloods leader gets 12 years for racketeering” by Linda Stein The Times (Trenton, New Jersey) Dec. 6, 2008. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Courtney in Anchorage, Alaska, and her teenage son disagree: Should that collection of music be called a mixtape or a mixed tape? The former is far more common, and reflects that linguistic process known as lenition or “softening,” in which the -ed...
Quntos KunQuest has been incarcerated at Angola, the Louisiana State Penitentiary, since 1997. His new novel This Life (Bookshop|Amazon), which draws on his experiences there, has earned acclaim in The New Yorker. KunQuest’s characters are vividly...