Look up into the night sky, and imagine that you’ve never heard the term Milky Way. What would you call that glowing band of stars across the heavens? In Sweden, it’s called Vintergatan, or “Winter Street.” In Hawaii, the Milky Way is sometimes called Iʻa-lele-i-aka, a name that translates as “fish jumping in shadows.” And in the Cherokee language, this celestial arc goes by a name that translates as “where the dog ran” — an allusion to a folktale about a dog that snatched some cornmeal in its mouth and spilled some as humans gave chase. This is part of a complete episode.
When you’re talking about the location of an inanimate object, is it okay to say that it lives there, as in The peanut butter lives in that cabinet or The flashlight lives on that shelf? Strictly speaking, of course, that object isn’t...
Sean in Oneonta, New York, says that when he was growing up in New Jersey, his family would pile in the car and set off on a surprise adventure, whether a short distance or long, and the kids would be told only that they were going on Buxtehude...
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