stymie

noun /ˈstaɪmi/

1. A situation where an opponent's ball is directly in the way of one's own ball and the hole, on the putting green (abolished 1952).

2. An obstacle or obstruction.

   Mary, will you be mine? Shall we go round together? Will you fix up a match with me on the links of life which shall end only when the Grim Reaper lays us both a stymie?

Where it comes from

From the meaning in golf (where the stymie ball blocks the other ball from "seeing" the hole), perhaps from Scots stymie, stimie (“person with poor eyesight”), from Scots stime (“the least bit”). Or from Scots styme (“tiny bit, glimmer”) as in se nocht ane styme (“not to see a glimmer (of something)”). If so, it is a doublet of stime.

Adapted from the Wiktionary entry stymie (CC BY-SA 4.0).

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