I am inviting my treasured subscribers and readers to help co-write a future post here at The 100 Billionth Person.  The subject, as best as I can frame it, will be shared shorthand. Let me explain…

You and your partner/best friend might use a word or phrase whose full meaning only the two of you understand.  Either of you might occasionally mention it in conversation with the other, to quickly convey a certain concept or idea.  The word/phrase likely sprang from a specific shared experience, but has since become your shorthand for a more general idea.

For example, I can name two shared-shorthand terms of ours: “The Ashley Principle” and “The John Sexton Rule.”  (I will explain the meaning of these when I compile the post.)

To clarify, shared shorthand is more than a simple analogy like, “This is just like the time we ran out of gas in Sheakleyville, Pennsylvania.”  Instead, just the word Sheakleyville suffices to refer (for the umpteenth time already) to the consequences of being inattentive to one’s fuel situation while driving late at night in the dead of winter in the middle of nowhere.  But more generally, the word Sheakleyville conveys the lack of foresight at the worst possible time.  At least it does in a certain household.

There should be a better term for this than shared shorthand.  Secret word and codeword sound too conspiratorial, while jargon and lingo refer more to local or in-group language.  It is not metaphor (e.g., “the world is a stage”) and not really metonymy (e.g., using “suit”  to refer to a business executive).  Maybe some English major who subscribes to the blog (you know who you are) can help us all out here.

In any event, I am calling on my readers to share personal examples of shared shorthand.  This will make the post more fun than me just writing about ours.  In your contribution, name the word/phrase, of course, along with some details about its origin and the shared meaning it now has for the two of you.  A few sentences would be fine, but feel free to be as lengthy as the story calls for.

Rather than post your contribution as a comment, I would prefer that you email it to me at the100billionthperson [at] gmail.com.  That way, I can compile and publish all the entries at the same time.  I will use contributors’ first names only.

I’d like to publish this post in the next few weeks, so please don’t delay!  I look forward to hearing/posting your shared shorthand examples and the stories behind them.  Thanks!