Untoward

 WORD OF THE DAY

untoward / adjective / un-TOH-erd

Definition
1a: difficult to guide, manage, or work with
1b: unruly, intractable
2a: marked by trouble or unhappiness
2b: unlucky
2c: not favorable
2d: adverse, unpropitious
3: improper, indecorous

Examples
"At 82, Judy Collins retains the crystalline tone that made her an icon of the early 1960s folk music movement, sounding so youthful … it's hard not to ask her whether she's made an untoward bargain with the devil."
— Andrew Gilbert, The San Francisco Chronicle, 17 Sept. 2021

Remove all human drivers and all of those untoward driving actions would presumably no longer exist
— Lance Eliot, Forbes, 5 Apr. 2021

Did You Know?
More than 700 years ago, English speakers began using the word toward for "forward-moving" youngsters, the kind who showed promise and were open to listening to their elders.
After about 150 years, the use was broadened somewhat to mean simply "docile" or "obliging." The opposite of this toward is froward, meaning "perverse" or "ungovernable."
Today, froward has fallen out of common use, and the cooperative sense of toward is downright obsolete, but the newcomer to this series—untoward—has kept its toehold.
Untoward first showed up as a synonym of unruly in the 1500s, and it is still used, just as it was then, though it has since acquired other meanings as well.