Manque is an adjective that means having failed at what one might have been.

Coming directly from the French word for ‘to lack,’ our word of the day is used to indicate an unfulfilled potential. Keep in mind, by the way, that when used, Manque is placed after the word it modifies — not before. Here’s an example:

My daughter can be downright militant when it comes to reporting people who don’t recycle as they should. By the time she graduated from college and got into the fashion industry, I had come to think of her as a police officer manque.