Grammar Grievances

My childhood best friend and I were both highly grammar-aware children; in fact, we would put on spelling bees for our whole circle of friends and one year even filmed a short movie featuring an old-fashioned one-room schoolhouse spelling bee scene (but that’s a story for another time).

As you might imagine, my bestie and I used to get into arguments about how to spell or pronounce certain words.

For example, when I was somewhere around eight or nine, somehow I wound up pronouncing “towel” (incorrectly) as something like “tal”—a clipped one-syllable utterance, and my friend never failed to admonish me (in her oh-so-motherly tone) to remember to insert that indispensible extra syllable: “Poor girl, this is not a ‘tal,’ it’s a ‘tow-elle’.”

A few years later I gave her back as good as I got when I heard her pronounce “mischievous” as mis-chee-vee-us, and was horrified because I knew without a doubt she was mistaken. I mean, the very spelling of the word basically contains its own self-explanatory pronunciation guide: mis-chie-vous. Three syllables, clear sound groupings, stress on the first syllable as opposed to the second; not a hint of an extra i anywhere between the v and the last s. It’s obviously pronounced exactly how it looks (besides that e, which admittedly makes the second syllable look like it should be a long e sound instead of a short e).

So I told that to my friend. We were in her family’s van driving somewhere and I had about two minutes to convince her before we arrived. Not surprisingly, she responded with the same motherly admonishment and slight melodramatic shock, along with more than a touch of arrogance added on top, which her advanced early-teen maturity had surely graced her with (as well, she was about a year and two months older than me, which I’m sure contributed to her self-assured confidence).

This is something like how our conversation went:

Her: What? It is definitely mis-chee-vee-us. I’ve never heard it pronounced the other way. I’m sorry, but that’s just not correct.

Me: Well, just because you’ve never heard it that way doesn’t mean it’s wrong.

Her: It’s totally not, though. Look it up in a dictionary!

Me: Uh, you look it up. I’m telling you, that’s the right way to say it.

Her: (laughing) Sorry, I just know I’m right.

Me: (frustrated) But what if you’re not?

(more laughing from my so-called BFF)

Me: I’m serious. It’s really pronounced mis-chi-vus.

By that time we’d arrived and were disembarking at our destination, so I was unfortunately unable to satisfactorily wrap up my mission of persuasion. The last thing I heard from her on that subject was derisive laughter (in that distinctly best-friend manner, of course).

To my recall, we never broached that particularly touchy topic again, but we definitely encountered plenty more grammar disputes where that one came from. Though I’m happy to say that, even with our strong opinions on grammar, we still remained the best of besties for many more good years.

Just to be clear, I’ve never stopped being a grammar-aware individual; I’m probably more enthusiastic about it now as an adult than I ever was as an adolescent. Also, I’m still of the firm persuasion that mis-chi-vus is the correct pronunciation, despite commonly hearing it said the other way. Incidentally, it’s the same story with the word “grievous,” with which I have plenty of grievances. All I can say is, look them up in a dictionary.

Anyway, my childhood bestie had better choose her words carefully if we ever meet again in the future.

(I’m kidding)

(mostly)

~~~

#nonfiction

#childhood

#memory