Dear Readers,
Having taught foreign languages (French and Spanish) for over 30 years, I know without a doubt what constitutes the past tense of verbs, including English verbs. These verbs come in two different forms: (1) the simple past, such as, "We spoke to the doctor last week." (2) a helping verb + a past participle, such as "We have spoken to that doctor twice before." This month I will focus on incorrect usage of the past tense in the English language.
Example: On Juan Pablo's season of "The Bachelor," Nikki is on a date with him. She's expressing her feelings about possibly being a step-mom to his young daughter. She says to him, "If I didn't think I was [mature enough], I wouldn't have came." *The correct past participle is come.
Example: Millionaire and Las Vegas entrepreneur Brian, on TV's "Millionaire Matchmaker," takes his date to an indoor rock climbing venue. He asks her, "Have you ever did this before?" *I will bet a million dollars that he did not make his money via his grammar or he would have done better.
Example: Entrepreneur Shawn Genenbacher on "Shark Tank" is searching for an investment in his Christmas lights company. When shark Kevin O'Leary asks him why he doesn't approach a local supplier, Shawn answers, "That opportunity hasn't arised yet." *Spell Check on my computer underlined this as a word that doesn't even exist. However, arisen is a word, and a past participle, that does exist.
Example: On "Live with Kelly and Michael" the morning after the Academy Awards, Denzel Washington was heard saying in gest, "Kelly didn't get nominated. She should've got nominated."
*At least Denzel has gotten nominated in the past.
Example: During an episode of "The King of Queens," wife Carrie wakes up her husband Doug who has fallen asleep at the bar where she has organized a work seminar. He tells her, "I must have fell asleep." *I'm surprised he hadn't fallen off his bar stool.
Example: Sheriff Walt Longmire, on the TV series that bears his name, is talking to a rodeo veterinarian about the practice of using "hot shots," or electric prods, on broncos during a rodeo event. The vet says, "Levi [a bronco rider and person of interest in a murder investigation] has a "hot shot" hid in his chaps." *Of course he means hidden. Actually, here it's an adjective but it derives from the past participle of the verb to hide. "I have hidden the Easter eggs for the children to find."
Example: On the TV show "Glee," Finn Hudson expresses to his mother a regret he has. "I could've spent more time writing that letter to the Army, or I could've wrote 50 letters to the Army." *If he had written those letters, would he have written them correctly?
Example: Arie, one of the men vying for "The Bachelorette" Emily's heart, says to the camera,
"I know that she was kind of shooken up about the whole Kalon thing [another suitor]. . ."
*Again, Spell Check to the rescue, but poor Arie didn't write this out first on his computer.
In the following four examples, the same incorrect past participle is used.
#1: Walter Sherman, aka "The Finder," finds in a tree an item that he was hired to locate. He says,
"I definitely would have went with the culvert." [as a better hiding place, I presume.]
#2: In the episode "Black and Blue" of TV's "Blue Bloods," Jamie Reagan is a NYPD officer who had previously graduated from Harvard. Yet he says, "Close call out there today, Sarge. Could've went either way but it went ours."
#3: On "Elementary," NYPD Detective Bell, after being off work due to an injury, pays a colleague to get his old desk back. The co-worker thinks Bell paid too much for the chore. Bell says, "I would've went twice as high."
#4: Detective Esposito on the show "Castle" is commenting on a woman's footwear. He declares, "I would have went open-toed."
*I hope I do not need to tell you readers that the correct past participle is gone. What is it with law enforcement, or more specifically, the writers of law enforcement characters? They must have such little faith in their characters' ability to speak well. Or is it that the writers themselves do not speak properly? Who knows?
Lastly, I must comment on the egregious spelling of the following helping verb found several times in Janet Evanovich's novel Three to Get Deadly. Lula, sidekick to the book's heroine and bounty hunter Stephanie Plum, says, "I should of shot him. I should of dropped a cap in that old coot."
*I realize that when we say "should've" [a contraction of should + have] it does sound like "should of," but that does not make it OK to write it and print it incorrectly. Shame on Ms. Evanovich.
So, dear Readers, I hope now we can leave the past behind and look forward to a more promising future of good English spoken here.
