It hates me and I hate it, what’s complicated about that?
It hates me and I hate it, what’s complicated about that?
Some people might think that Grammar and I have a complicated relationship. I don’t think so. I hate it and it hates me… oh, all right. We just barely tolerate each other. Every so often I follow its rules. Once in a while it lets me get away with breaking them while still allowing my meaning to come through.
I started off deploring Grammar. In high school, I was forced to diagram sentences for hours – and still those rules barely penetrated my brain. I just didn’t see the point. And then I started writing and all of a sudden I needed Grammar and it was nowhere to be found.
My husband laughed derisively at my run-on sentences, shook his head sadly when I didn’t know where to place a comma, and was galled by the fact that I didn’t – and still don’t – use semi-colons unless someone yells at me. And he wasn’t even raised in an English speaking country!! (Yes, he went to English medium schools and has been speaking the language – or some version of it – his whole life, but that’s neither here nor there.)
So I studied the damned thing. I took a class. I bought books. I read about it on web-sites. Now, I think, we’ve come to some sort of an understanding. I try to follow Grammar’s rules as best as I can. This is not so much because I believe in them, or even appreciate them, but more because I know that it’s important that I do so, so that my meaning can get across (and I don’t look like a total nincompoop claiming to be a writer but putting out unprofessional work). I even teach some grammar in my writing classes, because it’s just as important for my students to be able to use it properly as it is for me. I know I still make lots of mistakes (I can tell when my husband starts shaking his head as he reads through my work), but at least I can say that I make fewer than I did.
So, yes, it’s a difficult relationship we’ve got, Grammar and I. But, hopefully, if we continue to work at it, we might – dare I say it? – become friends someday.
*Addendum: My grammar-know-it-all daughter has read and approved (and corrected) this blog, but says she disagrees with the last sentence. L
