centre of the universe - the dreaming

"Myself" is a bit like a dildo.


WHOA, CENOBYTE!!! THAT'S TOTALLY TMI!!!


No, seriously. Stay with me here. I'm'a get back to that.

As I pointed out to Viper Pilot in one of the comments down there, formal English (Smarty Pants, we'll save the 'but that's how people talk' discussion for later, because you know my opinion on doing things a) simply because everyone else is doing them, and b) incorrectly) teaches us that saying "my friend and I" is incorrect.

Your grade two teacher probably told you that it is more proper to say "My friend and I" because it's a) more polite to list your friend first, and b) proper English. Well, Mrs. Gonadcrusher was, as our friend would say, mistooken. ((*\ /*)) (those are not boobs. Those are the Sarcasm Hand and the Humour Hand being deployed simultaneously)

Here's the deal.
Pronouns have what are called cases*. Special states of being dependent on what they are doing in a sentence. Kind of like freedom, incarceration, and parole, except nothing at all like that.

Whoa. Let's back up a bit, shall we? You remember what pronouns are, right? Okay, good. But just in case you're just SAYING you remember what a pronoun is so that I won't mock you, I'll just remind you: a pronoun is a word or phrase which replaces a noun or noun phrase (noun: person, place, or thing, for ease of reference).

Now. Pronouns have cases. I'm not going to list all the cases here, because you'll go crosseyed and stop reading, if you haven't already. But seriously; if you learn this stuff, you'll be, like, the smartest person on your block! Maybe even in your whole NEIGHBOURHOOD!

There is the nominative or subjective case. It is the **subject** of a sentence (the thing what the sentence is really about...not the same as the **topic** of the sentence, btw).
There is the objective case, which is the **object** of a setence (the thing what stuff is being done to).
There is the reflexive case, which is much easier to demonstrate than it is to explain (so that's what I'll do).

There are three cases for the first person pronoun (the one you use when you're referring to yourself).
"I" is subjective
"Me" is objective
"Myself" is reflexive

Observe:
I love the smell of napalm in the morning. -> "I" is the subject of the sentence; that which is taking the action, in this case. (incidentally, 'love' is the predicate, or verb; 'the smell of napalm' is the object; and 'in the morning' is a prepositional phrase).

Charlie is shooting at me. -> "Me" is the object of the sentence; that which is being acted upon, affected...the *what* of the sentence.

I shot myself in the foot. -> "Myself" is reflexive. That is to say, it is a pronoun which refers to an antecedant, or pronoun/noun/subject appearing earlier in the sentence.

The following is not now, never has been, and never shall be correct:
"Please respond to myself at your earliest convenience."
"Vincent or myself can help you select a palette"
"This was broken by myself"
"Myself loves cake."

(arguably, 'by myself' is a prepositional phrase which ostensibly means 'on my own' or 'alone'; that is not the way in which it is intended to be used in this example.)

Why is this not correct, cenobyte!? you ask. And you would be correct in asking this. Because PEOPLE ARE WRONG. They are attempting to use the reflexive case as the objective case (most often) or the subjective case (less frequently). They THINK that what they're saying makes them sound smart, but the opposite is true. Someone uses the reflexive first person pronoun incorrectly, and I think: "that person is a dink. Clearly, they think they're impressing me. They are wrong." There's a reason it sounds wonky.

Would you like to take a stab at what would be the *correct* and less mentally-developmentally-delayed way of saying the above sentences?
 
Back to the first sentence of this post. "Myself", as a reflexive, only operates as an aid to the original subject. I guess it doesn't HAVE to be a dildo. It could be a midget. Or possibly some kind of poorly-paid foreign exchange student who constantly pays attention only to you simply because you've convinced him/her that it's the way things are done in Canada...I just like making the comparison to a dildo because if you think of "modifying" as "pleasuring", reflexives, single handedly (heh), pleasure the first thing they come across (heh). Yes, I got through a good portion of my linguistics morphology classes by likening 'modifying' to 'pleasuring'.

--
*Other parts of speech have cases or tenses too; right now, we're only dealing with pronouns.

Labels: darkness, education, grammar, just wrong

I am positive this is the bridge that used to carry the trundling electric streetcars over the deceptively calm South Saskatchewan River. I rode on one of those electric buses once. I left my book in the back window. It was "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn". Of course, my book wasn't there by the time I rode the bus back across the river, and I was devastated; it was a tome my grandmother had suggested to me, and I did everything my grandmother suggested.

An afternoon of heavy, heart-rending sobs in the strange little stone house on King Street, and then back to the hospital after supper. My grandmother smiled at me. "You know, it's funny," she said.

"I don't think it's funny at *all*!" I moaned. "Huck was trying to thread a needle."

"No, sweetie. I think it's funny that you're this upset about it; it's just a book!"

But it wasn't just a book. It was the escape I'd brought with me, the fantasy that took me away from this city with its construction and sirens and Too Many People. It was the way out of this hospital with green and yellow walls, with people moaning in darkened rooms, curtains fluttering around beds that could hold anything, with any number of arms. "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" was my release from the knowledge that my grandmother was shrinking, growing smaller and more brittle, outshrinking her false teeth. While we slept in a fancy house on a fancy street in a fancy city, Nama was busy dying. It was not 'just a book.'

She must have seen that on my face. She patted the corner of the bed, and I sat close to her but not with her - I couldn't snuggle up beside her because she was covered in Gentian Violet, and didn't want to get it all over 'hell's half acre'. She'd drawn me a picture of the 'little chink doctors' who'd all come in to watch her dying - it was a learning hospital. That picture was in the book, holding my place. She'd drawn it in a shaky hand, and the stark white paper was stained with violet streaks - like my grandmother herself; her vibrant and brilliant soul streaking across the white plains of death.

"You know, I have that book."

I nodded glumly.

"I'll ask your uncle to bring it from home."

"Okay," I whispered. What I really wanted to say was please stop dying. I don't know how to do this without you. I haven't heard all your stories. You haven't taught me about cinnamon buns yet. I can see you dying; I know with every ounce of you that slips away.

She held my hand, squeezed it, her teeth clackety when she smiled. "That's one of my favourite books, too. Maybe when I get out of here, we'll find you a new one."

"Yeah," I said, and tried to smile.

I knew, even though she did everything she could to lie about it, even though everyone in the family lied to me about it. About the shadow of death skittering around the room, hiding in the shadows behind the curtain, under the sink in the bathroom. There was always a part of me that wondered what would have happened had I not lost that book.

Twenty-four years ago, with the ice still on the river, just like today. I know you are free, now, but I wish I knew when this would get easier.

Labels: darkness, Nama, Saskatoon

I was speaking to my friend, who was acting as my doctor, but my doctor from 1994. She was discussing with me all sorts of health issues, most of which are pretty good, until she shoved my file aside and looked me square in the face.

"Your problem isn't low thyroid. Your thyroid is fine."
"But I did these tests," I say.
"It's not your thyroid."
"Then what the hell is it?"
"You're depressed."
"No I'm not," I protest, although at the edges of my vision, the darkness begins to close in on me.
"Yes, you are. The good news is that there have been many advances in ..."
"No." I rise to my feet.
"I can't just let you go. You could be a danger to yourself or to others."
"You know who's a danger? Bloody drug companies that try to convince people that the biggest problem they have is that they don't feel *happy*. We're not supposed to be *happy*. Things aren't supposed to be all skittles and beer. If you get a moment of happiness in your *entire life* after the age of twelve, you should savour that moment, because it's not supposed to last forever. That's what makes them so precious. If you're particularly lucky, you might get a whole string of happy moments."
"You see? You're proving my point..."
"No!" I shout at her, dropping my accoutrements to the ground. "That's just the thing! It's not supposed to be miserable, either! IT's supposed to just *be*. If you can manage to do the things well and make something good happen for a few people, you're doing a bloody good job of things. What's a danger to myself and others are these huge corporations trying to sell everything from sex to continence to acne remedies. And maybe those three things are all related. Sure, some folks need medication; that's what they want us to believe. Sure, some of these drugs seem to help people. But you don't get to say I'm depressed because I don't have a Pollyanna view of the way things work."
"I wasn't..." she stammered.
"You *were*. Go hock your tawdry wares with someone else. I've seen that darkness; it's covered me before. It took five years of my life. Don't think I don't know when that darkness peeks out from the corners. Those are the days you hang the laundry on the line and open the house to the sun."

Then my children climbed into bed with me. Had they not, I'd have woken angry that some quack of a pysician tried to prescribe antidepressants after having had me in her office for no more than five minutes, and hearing the words "I'm more tired than usual". As it was, I woke to kisses and snuggles and one of those moments you live your whole life to find.

Labels: darkness, dreams, rants