I was out shoe shopping with my 14-year-old daughter the other day, trying to get her to buy anything that wasn't made by Adidas, when I spied a cute pair of booties and quickly grabbed them and held them up.
"What about these?" I asked her hopefully.
"Eww mom, those are hit!" she said, barely giving them a glance.
"They're what?"
"Hit. Those boots are hit." She must have seen the blank look on my face because she sighed dramatically and rolled her eyes. "Omg it's short for hideous." Then she strolled off towards the Stan Smiths.
It was one of the moments when I officially felt every one of my 47 years. Because I have always thought of myself as one of those cool moms who knew what the hell her kids were talking about it. Looks like I thought wrong.
Luckily, the Today show is here to enlighten me with one of its "Teens Tell All" segments, in which a bunch of kids give all us old folks the 411 on the lingo they use to text and talk. Trust me when I tell you that even if you've got words like "bae" and "fleek" and now "hit" down, you're really just scratching the surface.
Some of the sayings are pretty easy to understand. "Lit," for example, means something that is cool or awesome. As in, That party was so lit. Of course, you can also remove the word "so" and instead insert "AF"—for "as f*ck"—at the end of the sentence and you'll get the same point across: "That party was lit AF."
You with me so far? Good. Because an offshoot of lit is "fire," used to describe something or someone who is trendy or hot: That dress is fire. Use the fire emoji in a text or in the comment section of an Instagram post, and you'll convey the same message.
Now this is where things start to get tricky. Your "fam," for example, is not your family, but your crew of closest friends, also known as your "squad." Add the word "goals" after that—as in "squad goals" and you now officially have a friendship that everyone else wants. You know, like the one between Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake. Or Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid.
If something is "all gucci" (my daughter's personal current fave) it's "all good," and if you're "savage" you're a badass. But if someone calls you "basic," it means you're mainstream in a bad way. As in, Girls who drink pumpkin spice lattes are so basic. And being called "salty" is even worse—it means you're acting bitchy, bitter, or rude.
Don't shoot the messenger, OK?
A few others that I sometimes hear my kids use include: "V," which means very; "thirsty," which means "desperate"; "sus" for "suspect"; and "RT"—which stands for "retweet," and means "I agree."
Me: This list is getting confusing.
You: RT.
Threre's also GOAT, which stands for greatest of all time; skurt, which means go away or leave; "I'm dead," which you say when something is so funny or awesome that you literally cannot even; and high key/low key, which mean wanting everyone to know something and not wanting anyone to know something, respectively.
I high key want to be a cool mom, but I low key have no clue what half of these words mean.
So salty.
Head over to Today.com to check out the rest of the teen slang glossary.
Hollee Actman Becker is a freelance writer, blogger, and a mom. Check out her website holleeactmanbecker.com for more, and then follow her on Twitter at @holleewoodworld.
