The goal of Idiom of the Week is to showcase some of the many commonplace idiomatic expressions found in the English language in order to help you understand them better. This week, however, we have chosen a more unconventional expression to show you: “I’ll burn that bridge when I get to it.”
This phrase is what is sometimes known as a malaphor or a mixed idiom, which is a phrase that blends two similar figures of speech to create a new one, that may or may not make much sense. In the malaphor we have chosen this week, there are two conventional idioms at play- “to burn one’s bridges” and “I’ll/we’ll cross that bridge when I/we get to it”. To make (some) sense of what blending these two expressions might mean, let us first look at what they mean on their own.
Collins Dictionary defines the expression to burn one’s bridges as the action of doing something which “forces you to continue with a particular course of action, and makes it impossible for you to return to an earlier situation or relationship.”
On the other hand, to cross that bridge when you get to it has a positive connotation. Collins Dictionary, again, defines the phrase as dealing with a problem or a difficult situation when it comes up and “not to anticipate difficulties”.
So, when someone says that they will “burn that bridge when [they] get to it”, they expect to deal with an upcoming difficulty badly which will result in permanently cutting ties or alienating other people involved. In a nutshell, you are setting yourself up to fail in dealing with a future problem.
If you would like to learn more of these unusual idioms, take a look at Mixed Idioms on Twitter and tell us your favorites!
