(This appeared in Newsday’s Act2 section)

About old dogs, of which I am one:

If my wife and I were to relocate to the United Kingdom — something we have considered because our daughter lives in London and, more to the point, last year gave birth to a grandboy — what new tricks might be involved?

We haven’t seen the little bugger in person yet, since he arrived a couple of months into the pandemic. So the theory is that — because of layers of possible quarantining, testing, maybe even the near-future need to search out vaccine booster shots — a routine coming and going between jolly old England and this former colony might present enormous, expensive hassles.

Pack up and go for good, then? My wife and I are semiretired, which is one less reason to remain on Long Island, much as I like the place.

But a major concern is that I would have to learn to speak English.

I’d have to start walking on pavements instead of sidewalks, wearing a jumper instead of a sweater, going on holiday instead of vacation, spelling such words as flavor and color with a “u.”

Did you know that the English don’t wear underpants? No, really. Those things are pants over there, and the longer garments on top of them are trousers, essential because nobody is supposed to see their pants. They don’t wear vests, either (not that I do); they wear waistcoats. And soccer players — sorry, footballers — wear kits not uniforms.

The admission here is that I don’t have a particularly good ear for language. In a half-century as a journalist, fortunate to experience a fair amount of international travel, I never got much past bare-bones translations that could be mystifying. Czech for “yes” is “ano,” pronounced “ah-no.” No? Yes? In Japanese, “yes” is “hai,” which sounds like a friendly greeting: “Hi.”

Kind natives in far-off lands always helped with words for “please” and “thank you,” “good morning” and so on, so temporary foreign visits never were a problem. But there is this nagging feeling that, if I were to attempt full-time residency in Great Britain — try to really fit in — might I be expected to know something about Old English? Be able to recite a few lines of “Beowulf”?

   Hwaet. We Gardena in geardagum,

   Beodcyninga, brym gefrunon,

   Hu oa aebelingas ellen fremedon.

Or, at least some “Jabberwocky.”

   ‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

   Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

   All mimsy were the borogoves,

   And the mome raths outgrabe.

My first car was British-made. An MGB. So way back in college days I became familiar with the fact that a trunk is a boot and a hood is a bonnet. Years ago, I even drove a rental in England and Wales — on the other side of the road! — though my familiarity with standard transmission wasn’t much help because I kept reaching for the stick shift with the wrong hand, putting myself in constant danger of opening the door instead of progressing from first to second gear.

I recall an essay by Sarah Lyall, an American who spent years as a newspaper correspondent based in London, asking why Brits “keep apologizing? Were they truly sorry?” And it’s a fact that the English, who certainly strike me as a polite lot, say “sorry” a lot. They also say “brilliant” all the time. Which, frankly, is a decided improvement on the overused American “awesome.”

Probably, the adjustments in communications would be no more daunting than during my youth, spent in five states because my father’s job included regular transfers. It turned out that dollar bills, “singles” in some places, are “ones” in others; that a “bag” sometimes is a “sack” and a “stoop” is a “porch.”

For a while there, if I asked for a “Coke” to drink, I got the question: “What kind?” Because a “coke” was any brand of “soda” in some climes. And though I never lived in a house with a “basement” then, I still don’t. Because, for my wife and her family’s New England roots, it’s a “cellar.”

You get the point. We could rent a flat, enjoy biscuits instead of cookies, mind how we go. Just have to work on being linguistically nimble. With a stiff upper lip.