You Say Lay, I Say Lie: Let’s Call the Usage Thing Off

Sympathy for my physical frailties has not diminished the ardor of my critics. My boast that I allow myself only two errors a year naturally inspires them to greater vigilance.

A gentleman I met recently attacked at once. He pointed out that in writing about my wife’s bringing my wheelchair to the hospital, I wrote as follows:

“She loaded the chair in her car and tried to start it. No luck.” He argued that it sounded as if she tried to start the wheelchair. I admitted to some ambiguity, but pointed out common sense should have left no doubt it was the car that wouldn’t start. (Close call.)

Ted Johnson protests my argument that “Let a Little Sunshine In” is a perfect example of why it is good grammar to end a sentence with a preposition, despite the supposed rule against it. “In the sentence in question,” he says, “ in is an adverb.”

That’s too fine a point for me. If true, it simply shows that a preposition may function as an adverb. I still say a preposition is a good thing to end a sentence with.

My lapses, if they are lapses, cast a cloud over the fact that I am a member of a panel of writers chosen by Houghton Mifflin Co. to judge the acceptability of certain controversial usages for the next edition of the American Heritage Dictionary.

I doubt any of my judgments will be useful, but it is fun to think my input may help decide whether a usage is acceptable or not.

With the questionnaire comes this qualification: “We are interested in your judgment of acceptability , a bit different from approval. To say that a usage is acceptable is not necessarily to say that you would use it yourself or that it is stylistically satisfactory, but merely that in your opinion it doesn’t offend against any standards of correctness.”

They first ask whether I think it’s OK to begin a sentence with however . I didn’t know it was considered wrong. However, I ruled that it was OK with me.

Next, would I use they or them in this sentence. “It isn’t them / they that we have in mind.” I’m afraid I’m careless in speech. I would probably say them. However, I might write they .

“It wasn’t me who rang your bell in the middle of the night.”

Almost everyone says me. So would I. My wife, on the other hand, would say I . She’s very particular about her pronouns.

Similarly, would you say, “That’s him “ or “That’s he .” Almost everyone says him. In cop movies a witness is often asked to identify a suspect. Have you ever heard one say “That’s he “? Never.

(The distinction between lie and lay is similarly lost. When I was in rehabilitation every therapist, without exception, said lay when lie would have been correct. “Lay down here.”)

The questionnaire asks whether I would write “To myself, mountains are the beginning and end of nature.” No. I would write me. Besides, I don’t care for mountains that much.

Here’s one that annoys me. “The Yankees are still very much alive, as far as the divisional race.” A thousand times no. As awkward as it may be, one must complete the phrase: “as far as the divisional race is concerned.” This usage is creeping not only into speech but also into writing.

Next. “ As far as something to do on the weekend, we didn’t even have miniature golf.” This error can be corrected by writing as for instead as far as. That test sentence must have been written in the 1930s, when miniature golf courses sprang up on every vacant lot.

In this sentence, is spaces acceptable? “We’re trying to teach people to create the safe spaces they need in their relationships and in their lives.” Spaces in this sense is psychobabble and is here to stay, just as relationships in this sense is.

“FBI agents fanned out to monitor a small infrastructure of persons involved with established terrorist organizations.” Question: Is infrastructure acceptable there? I have never known exactly what infrastructure means and I avoid it entirely.

“Let’s find a quality restaurant to take them to.” Is quality in that sense acceptable? American Heritage says quality is an adjective, as well as a noun. So is gourmet . So there’s nothing wrong with quality restaurant, or with gourmet restaurant, though both usages are frowned on by purists.

Of course, correct speech has its place. There is a story that William Lyon Phelps, the Yale professor, once knocked on a dormitory door and was asked, “Who’s there?” He answered, “It is me, Dean Phelps.” Those inside wouldn’t let him in because they assumed Phelps would have said, “It is I.”

Like my wife.

Jack Smith’s column is published Mondays.