Words

You guys—in case you didn't know, I'm a grammar nerd.

In 10th grade, Mrs. Roger's English class, we spent time at the beginning of each class period doing something she called "Daily Oral Language," where she would put a transparency up on the projector with three sentences, and we would have to take out a piece of paper and correct them. Edit them (or proclaim there was nothing wrong with them). I don't think she even picked up our papers when we were finished, but maybe she did. Then we would discuss. Either way—this was without a doubt the very best part of my day when I was 15.

How lame is that?

I LOVE the English language, for all its inconsistencies and exceptions to the rules. I LOVE knowing the rules and why they sometimes don't apply. I love verb tenses, and adjectives, and punctuation. I love all of it.

In my current job, I happily spend at least a third of my time editing things. Sometimes it's long documents, sometimes it's interface text on a screen that users of our software will see. Sometimes it's a bullet point in an email that someone sends me to read over really quickly for a presentation or marketing flier. I never get tired of it.

I never get tired of finding the best way to craft a sentence. I write this blog to have an excuse to do just that, in my own voice (instead of corporate software voice, which is what I typically use at work).

Aside from using grammar rules and looking up exceptions and examples in my trusty Gregg Reference Manual, I collect words: words I love to say and use, like schadenfreude, and phrases in which people use the wrong words, which are known as malapropisms.

For example:

• A coworker the other day commented that something was "just a fragment of [her] imagination."

• I heard someone on a vacation say that she was taking a picture "for prosperity."

• My friend Bob used to say he was "making a v-line" for something, instead of a bee-line. (In his defense, when you point your index finger in the direction you are headed with your thumb in the air, it does make the shape of the letter V.)

I'm such a dork, these things crack me up. I keep a running list at my desk.

I love writing. Why then, you may ask, am I wasting my time at a corporation where I write instruction manuals and training presentations? Well, it isn't SO bad—I do feel like I get to be creative and help our clients in a positive way. It's not my dream job though…I'd rather just write. Fiction, essays, poetry, song lyrics. I say this a lot, to myself and to other people. I just don't DO anything about it. I should. I will. I just don't know when.

In the meantime, thanks for reading my little blog, where I stretch my creaky old unused literary muscles. I appreciate your readership. Just wanted you to know. You know, for prosperity.