Wordaholics Anonymous

Hi, my name is Mary and I’m a wordaholic. Not only do I love to speak words, read words, and write words, I am pretty persnickety about the use of words as well. I was brought up by two parents who were determined that my brother and I would learn how to talk properly without adopting the Buffalo flat “a” accent. (When I was young, my mother and I went shopping for an Easter hat for me. One of the many I tried on brought this statement from the sales clerk: “There’s a gayap in the bayack of your hayat”. I’m serious; it was that bad. I was afraid to look at my mother, lest we both burst out laughing.)

In school, as well as at home, I learned to use the pronouns “I/he/she” when they are the subject of a sentence, and using “me/him/her” when the are the object of the sentence. I’m sure it helped that I took three years of Latin in high school, during which these difficult concepts were indelibly drilled into my head. It helped that my parents spoke flawless English. My maternal grandparents had both taught in “normal” schools, and my grandfather especially was unmerciful (but still loving!) in his corrections. We learned to say things correctly, my brother and I.

When my kids were growing up, I did my darnedest to ensure good English usage, but the prevailing winds of misusing “I” and “me” was, apparently, stronger than I was. One of my sons continually uses the pronoun “I” as both the subject and the object a sentence, but fortunately not often in the same sentence. I still correct him now and then, but somehow it doesn’t ‘take’. He’ll say, “yeah, that too.” I still love him. But when radio and TV newscasters, speakers that are assumed to be part of the intelligentsia, and writers (yes, writers! How does it get past their editors?!) misuse “I” and “me”, I am really upset and I lose hope for the future of correct English usage. I don’t understand enough spoken Spanish to determine whether this use of subject/object pronouns happens in that language (and others) as well. However, there used to be a Romanian software engineer who was appalled by the usage errors made by educated and native English speakers.

Besides the “I”–“me” issue, there are several others, many of which I grant various degrees of clemency. For instance, I am fairly lenient about “lie, lay, lain” and “lay, laid, laid”, especially in the past perfect tense (“I had just lain down when the doorbell rang.” or “I had just laid the baby down for a nap when the doorbell rang.”). If you don’t see the difference, you’re definitely in the majority; don’t worry about it. But here’s the skinny on lie and lay. (This “lie” is not the fib.)

The verb “lie” is intransitive (there is no object that the verb applies to; it can take an adverb, but not an adjective), and it is used as follows:

I’m lying on the couch. (present)
I’m going to lie down for a nap. (future)
I lay down earlier today and slept too long. (past)
After I had lain down yesterday, the phone wouldn’t stop ringing. (past perfect)

The verb “lay” (meaning to place something somewhere) is transitive and takes an object. It is used as follows:
You can lay your coat on the bed in the room down the hall. (present)
When I get back from the store, I’ll lay the baby down for a nap. (future)
I’m sure I laid the keys on the table last night. (past)
I had laid the remote on the couch, but when I came back, it was gone. (past perfect)

Another common misdemeanor by the news media is the “less”–“fewer” usage. If you had 12 apples in a bowl when you left for work this morning, and you have only 6 apples in the bowl when you get home, you have 6 fewer apples, not less apples. However, if you had twenty dollars with you when you left for work, and ten dollars when you got home, you’d have fewer dollars, and less money. So: “fewer” is used when you are using plural units, e.g. dollar – dollars, and “less” is used before a word that is a plural noun used as a singular noun. “Money” can be a penny or a billion dollars, but you don’t have “fewer money”. You have less money with fewer dollars and fewer quarters. My rule of thumb, which works almost every time, is to use “fewer” with quantifiable plurals (e.g., dogs, bicycles, men) and ”less” with words whose singular refers to a plural ‘group’ (e.g., money, candy, jewelry).

Teen speak is another bête noire for me; I keep wondering if their babies will say, “like, mama” as their first words. I’m not LOL! The shortening of words while chatting online, twittering tweets, and texting on a cell phone or in emails is another worry. Will the burgeoning generation be able to lose the teen speak as they go to college or out in the world? OMG, I hope so!