Nervio

Dash has lived his entire life under the threat of being punched in the face, hard, by both his Aunty J and his father. The fact that I haven't yet eaten his cheeks clean off his head is a testament to my self-control. When he started school his teachers warned me that he would likely be returned to me with bite marks on his thighs.

There is, I learned yesterday, a word to describe this barely-controlled insanity of loving a person so much you just want to beat them to death. It is, in my opinion, the greatest word in any language: nervio.

Pablo and Claude illustrate nervio