Comment by gjm11
5 days ago
Side-note: for me, at least, "salty" isn't anything to do with tears; in my idiolect when someone's "salty" it doesn't mean they're sad, it means they're angry or offended or something along those lines. The metaphor is more about how salt (in large quantities) tastes strong and sharp.
(Which maybe illustrates that a metaphor can succeed even when everyone doesn't agree about just what it's referring to, as you're suggesting "call" may have done.)
'Salty' in that context means 'bitter', ironically.
I would say “resentful”, “disgruntled”, “aggrieved”. “Bitter” feels like a more longer-lasting, somewhat less emotional condition to me.
And I agree that it has nothing to do with tears. The actual etymology stems from sailors: https://www.planoly.com/glossary/salty
True enough, there are endless subtleties to language (English in particular) that make words simultaneously vague and extremely specific.
Wiktionary defines bitter as "cynical and resentful", which doesn't quite capture the "more longer-lasting, somewhat less emotional condition" part of it.
This is actually a great example. I think for a lot of these words, everyone has a different interpretation, but somehow it ends up working for everyone. It's not important that everyone remembers them the same way, but that everyone feel like the word fits even they have different independent interpretations.