the bogeyman will get you
The word "bogeyman" is said to derive from the term "bugis," used to decribe Indonesian and Malaysian pirates who terrorized French and English sailors. The word was brought back from the seas, inverted into "bugisman," and used to frighten Euro children into squirming compliance—"If you're bad, the bugisman will get you!"
When I was a kid, my parents and older siblings would scare my obsessive, nightmare-prone mind with threats that if I didn't obey them, the bogeyman would get me. I was told that he'd come into my bedroom at night while I was sleeping and "get" me. Maybe because the word "boogie" was one of the countless racial slurs our family used for blacks, I pictured the bogeyman as a fat, middle-aged black man with bulging eyes.
What did they mean, though, that he would "get" me? I had no conception of sexual abuse, so I don't think they meant he'd ass-ream me. And if they meant he would kidnap me—taking me away from them—I really wouldn't have minded.
The word "get" has several meanings, one of which is synonymous with "understand." Maybe my family members were really saying, "I don't understand you—maybe the bogeyman will."
