Longtime Affair Vocabulary [Effortless English DVD1 > LV2 > 04]

Welcome to the vocabulary lesson for Longtime Affair. Let's get started right away.

Okay. The letter begins with the headline: Longtime affair appears set to last for long time to come.

Alright. An affair means… It has a couple meanings. In this case, “affair” means a relationship outside of marriage. It means sex outside of marriage. So, it means you are married, but you have sex with another person. Or it.. it sometimes can mean even if you have a boyfriend or a girlfriend and then you have sex with another person, we call that “an affair”, (It’s a noun, “an affair”).

So, this letter is from a woman. And she's having an affair. She's having sex with another guy, not her husband.

Okay, and it's been… its..  And she says, “set to last..”

“Set” means (ah..) prepared, or ready, ready to last.

“For a long time”, it means it's going to continue for a long time. To last. “To last”, using it, “to last” as a verb. Now you know the word “last”. You’re first, second, third and then last. But here using it as a verb “to last”. And “to last” means to continue. And it gives the idea how much time that's something continue. You say, “the movie lasted past tense”, “The movie lasted two hours”. It means the movie was two hours long. the movie continued for two hours. It lasted. So, “to last”, “to last” as a verb means, (ah).. time period; how long something continues; to continue for some time. “To last”.

Okay, and then she says, “I married, he's married. We’re in love and have been for eight  year's. We've tried breaking it off several times.”

“To break something of” means to stop doing it. Or it means to get away from something, to escape from something. So, if you have an affair, means you're you're having sex with another person, and you try to break off the affair.

“Break it off” means to finish it; stop doing it; escape from it; get away from it.  Alright! So to break it off. To break something off.  Of course there's a direct meaning, it can mean you really do break something. But in this case, “to break off” means to stop doing something; to not continue doing it. And it can also mean to escape from; get away from. Gets a break off; to break off something. To break it off.

Okay she says, “but a force bigger than both of us keeps bringing us back together.”

“A force” means some power; A power. Maybe… I don't know what she's talking about, but, some kinda natural feeling, some strong power inside them. Or maybe outside them. Maybe *** something. But whatever, some big power keeps bringing them together again, they tried to stop but then they get back together again, and again.

Okay. She says before this, she never believed in soulmates or true love.

“A soulmate” (is a noun), a soulmate is your perfect partner. Its the perfect match for you in the world, in the universe. Alright, if  you say, “she is my soulmate”, it means “she is my perfect match”, “she's the perfect person for me”. It's more than just love. It's more than just a girlfriend or boyfriend. It's more even more than just husband or wife. It’s the idea that's your life partner. (Someone with a very very deep connection). So this man is her soulmate.

Okay. She says, “our love is deep and unconditional.”

“Unconditional”,  “unconditional”. “Unconditional” means without conditions. Without conditions. A condition is a rule or a circumstance, or a situation. (Okay. That’s a condition).  So without conditions means without rules. So, what does that mean? “Unconditional love”.  We use this phrase a lot: Unconditional love.

“Unconditional love” means love without rules. It means you love somebody in any situation, it doesn't matter what happens, you will always love them, nothing  can change it. “Unconditional love!”

If they kill your brother, you will still love them. If they steal your money, you will still love them. If they hit you in the face and kick you in the stomach, you will still love them. That is unconditional love. It means in any conditionin, in any situation,  anything happens, it doesn't matter. You will still love them. That is unconditional love. “Unconditional love”.

So she’s saying with this man she has unconditional love. Nothing can change it. Even something bad happens. Even though they have some problems. They still love each other… (the same).

She says, “our roots are intertwined..”

First, the word “intertwined”, “intertwined”. “Inter-“ means between. Okay, and ”twine” that means tied together. So, tied together in between it means wrapped around each other. So, you can imagine if the… If I take some string and I take another piece of string, and I... I wrapped them together, I tie them together many many many times, we say that is “intertwine”. The two strings are intertwined. They're wrapped together many times

“Roots”, you can imagine “roots”.  The roots have a plant. The roots have a tree .The roots grow down, and then a another tree is next to it, and those roots also grow down and then they mixed together, right? The roots  of each tree mixed together and they go around each other. And then they become connected, we say those roots are intertwined. Their wrapped around each other, they go around each other and they're connected very strongly.

So what does she mean, “our roots are intertwined”? - Well I don't know exactly. But I think she means “roots”,  she means their deep deep emotions, their deep thoughts, their deep feelings are connected very strongly. They’re around each other, they're connected, they’re intertwined. So their roots are intertwined. Their deep feelings are intertwined.

She says, “It's a shame that it happened late in life.”

“It's a shame” means it's too bad. “It's a shame” means it's a bad situation or its unfortunate. it's really the best. Probably the best meaning. It's unfortunate, it's a shame. It’s the shame... it’s the shame…  Some people say  it's a pity. “It's a pity!” I hear a lots of teenagers say “it's a pity!”

But in fact, “it's a pity” is not so common in normal speech. Back to ***it  says, “it's a pity all the time.” It’s kinda cute! Ah.. but what we really say it’s.. “it's a shame”? It's more common phrase: It's a shame; It's too bad; It's unfortunate; It's a shame; it happened late in life.

So, she saying, “Oh, I wish I met him when I was younger. It's a shame that we met later in life.”

But it's okay. She says, “he always treats me like a queen.”

Treats me. “Treats me”. “He always treats me like a queen!” “Treats me” means our treat someone. “To treat someone” means that's how you behave, it's how you act, towards them.

So if I…  If you say “he treats me like a queen”, it means he's very very nice to me/to her. Alright.  He's very very nice to her. He imagines, he pretends that she is a great Queen. This wonderful person! He serves her, he's always so kind to her, he treats her like a queen.

Now we have another phrase in English which is “He treats me like a dog!”

“He treats me like a dog!” Well, that's the opposite meaning. It means he is very cruel, very mean, very bad, not respectful, not kind.  “He treats me like a dog”, it means he's yells at you, and gives you bad food and.. it’s very unkind; not kind.

Alright. So “treats me”, “treats me”; it's how  you act, how you behave towards another person with another person.

Alright. And then she says, “neither of us is eaving our spouse or family.”

They're not going to leave their spouses. A spouse is a husband or a wife. So husband is a man, wife is a woman. But a spouse is a man or a woman, doesn't matter. Means husband or wife.

So they're not gonna leave their husbands or wives. She can not gonna to leave them.

She says but she's going to continue seeing this man. (Continue with the affair. Because it's magical. They love each other unconditionally.)

And finally in the last paragraph she asks Abby, “Is it wrong? Do we go on until something changes?”

“To go on” it means to continue, to keep doing what you're doing. Should they go on with the affair? Should they continue the affair? Should they keep doing it? So, “to go on”, “to go on”. “To go on means to continue. To go on means keep going, keep… keep doing it.  “?Go on”.

She says, “Or should we try  again to break away?”

Here we have “break away”, again, si..similar to “break it off”. “Break away” means escape. It definitely means get away, to escape, to leave some situation, to break away from a situation”. So to break aways is to leave a situation. To get away from a situation.

Okay. **** she says, “an affair, no matter how you slice it, will never be accepted.”

“No matter how you slice it”, this is a slang phrase in American English. ”No matter how you slice it” means in the any situation. It means however you look at the situation, even if you're… if you're a man or a woman, if you're rich or poor, it doesn't matter. everybody will agree with the same opinion.

So, “no matter how you slice it” means no matter how you look at it, no matter who you are, it doesn't matter. Everybody agrees. An affair is not acceptable. So, no matter how you slice it, no matter how you slice it, the affair will never be accepted. She says “an affair, no matter how you slice it”, means any opinion doesn't matter everybody agrees. An affair no matter how you slice it will never be accepted in the eyes of traditional society.

Ah. So, now she saying “who”, who can't accept it. “In the eyes of”, means in the opinion of. In the opinion of. So, in the eyes of traditional society. So traditional society cannot accept it. In the eyes of/in their opinion traditional society cannot accept it.

So maybe in the eyes of other people, someone else maybe it's okay. Alright. In their eyes, in the eyes of this woman the affair is OK. But in the eyes of traditional society…  all the society the affair is not OK. So, “in the eyes” that means in the opinion, of whose opinion.

She says finally, “It will be perceived as unacceptable”.

“Perceived”. To perceive means to see something. But it really has a deeper meaning than just seeing. It… What it really means is how you judge what you see. So. For example. I’ll give you an example, a man runs out of a building. He’s run out of  a buildining. And he’s screaming, “Ahhhhh………”.  Everybody sees the man. Everybody hears the man screaming. But everyone will have a different opinion about what is happening. Right? One person says, “Oh, he's angry. This man is very very angry.” But you ask another person they say, “Oh, no. He's not angry. He's afraid. This man is very afraid”. You ask a third person. And the third person says, “Oh, no no no. He's hurt. This man is hurt. He feels pain. Something's wrong.”

Alright! If the same situation. Everybody sees the same thing. And they hear the same thing. But they perceive something different. So, “perceive” is really what you see plus what you think. That's what “perceive” means. What you see or hear, or feel, plus what you think. Those two together is that means “perceive”. To perceive as a verb.

So, she’s saying, “People will  perceived the affair as unacceptable.”

They will see it and they will think. They will decide it's not good. It doesn't… Now is it  really unacceptable? Is it really bad? Well, I don't know. We don't know. Right?  Then we would use the verb is... We say, “the affair is unacceptable” means it's a totally correct. Everybody agrees it's unacceptable. But we use the verb “perceive”, it means that's what people's think. That's their opinion. But it might be wrong. To perceive. “Perceive” as the idea of opinion. It's what you see and hear, plus your opinion.

Alright. And finally she signs it: Bewitched, bothered and bewildered in New York

Bewitched is like a… magic, right? You see the word “witch” in that word. It means a… a witched has put a spell on you, it means you're under the effect of magic. So, she.. she’s saying that she feels some kind of magical feeling she's bewitched because if this great man.

“Bothered”, “bothered” means upset. We've had “bothered” before. “Bothered” means upset or annoyed. Upset; Annoyed; Bothered.

So, she also feels a little bit annoyed then bothered. Because it's a difficult situation .

And finally, “bewildered”.

“Bewildered” means confused. Confused. So, this woman feels bothered. She's a little.. ah… annoyed and upset. But he's also bewildered. She's confused. She doesn't know what should she do. “Bewildered”. Bewildered.

Alright! That is the end of this lesson. The vocabulary lesson. Umm… Listen to it a few times and then move on to the miny story. Bye-bye!

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