#WordUse Series:
The Soda / Pop Conundrum

My siblings and I talk like Midwesterners, although none of us live there (or have ever lived there). Our mother was a Midwesterner: born and raised in Chicago. Daddy was also a Midwesterner, born/raised in St. Louis, although he had Southern roots: his mother was...

Communication Is the Thing

Back in the early ’90s, I learned a new way of communicating. Communicate: to make known; to inform; to convey knowledge or information; to impart or transmit; to send information or messages sometimes back and forth; speak, gesticulate, or write to another to convey...

Overwriting: Relax, You’re Trying Too Hard

Many years ago—long before my editing days—I was reading my hot-off-the-press copy of Pat Conroy’s The Prince of Tides. (Before lights out, in bed, where I still do my pleasure reading.) There was one paragraph (among many) that was so exquisite, so perfect, that I...

Proper English: Us Versus Them

A writer friend of mine posted a little meme* on Facebook the other day: Never make fun of someone if they mispronounce a word. It means they learned it by reading. I doubt there’s any data to support this but I feel the truth of it in my bones, having been a child...