To The Comma

You are, by far, the most misunderstood and abusedof all the punctuation marks. Though young writers are baffled by the semi-colon, your distant cousin, they could, in fact, live their whole lives without one and though it would make their writing more dull, at least it would be grammatically correct.

Periods are easy. Colons are simple, even if what comes after them isn’t. Hyphens get used for dashes, but we all know they meant a dash, so no harm done. Despite the rule that each writer gets three exclamation points, everyone borrows more. Sadly, we don’t savor them like truffles or aged brandy or that silence when the house is finally empty, the dogs sleeping. We should, but we don’t.

Surprisingly, the question mark troubles some writers. Is it because sometimes the question asked isn’t really a question, the author knowing the answer all along and the reader knows the author knows, or is it because the end of the sentence is so far away from the beginning the writer has forgotten this is, in fact, a question? Hard to say.

But all the other punctuation marks seem to have one purpose. Ending a sentence? Period. Have a speaker? Quotation marks. Embedding information that could be lifted seamlessly out of the sentence? Grab your parentheses.

Comma, you, however, have to do all the dirty work that the other marks can’t. You are the duct tape of writing tools, plastered here and there, sometimes effectively and stunningly well-placed, but then other times, recklessly so that you ruin not only the meaning but the very aesthetics of the sentence. It’s not your fault.

And I don’t blame the teachers. I’ve yet to find a way to fully explain the nuances of the comma, indeed of all grammar, to students. Many are told to put a comma wherever there’s a pause, but then, I say, all grammar is pauses, some longer than others. And sometimes we pause and don’t have any punctuation so what then? 

I’m going to have to say “dependent clause” and I have to explain that a clause is not a phrase. I’m going to have to say “coordinating conjunctions,” “coordinate adjectives,” and “appositives.” Sadly, this is the language needed to know how to use you. 

I don’t blame them. Like any form of critical thinking, this will take years to master and I can see they really want to get it. And then suddenly, one day, when they are writing to their beloved or to argue their tax bill or when they plead with their senator to pass a bill, you make sense. Your exact placement will matter like never before. They will hang, with confidence, their entire meaning on you, tiny hook. And it will be right.

To Upgrades

Sometimes, we save months or years for the upgrade.

 

An efficiency apartment: one room and two doors, one for the entrance and one for the bathroom. Then, a one bedroom. An entirely separate bedroom. Then a house, but still renting. Then a house, still renting, in a nicer neighborhood. Then a nicer city. Then a house you own. The housing bubble works in your favor. A bigger house. When you wake up in the morning and make your breakfast, everyone else can sleep and not hear you.

The cars get newer, the clothes get better. The wine gets just a little older. Aged.

You’re lucky. You’re the first to admit it.

Other upgrades just come to us, not because of our patience, not because we have finally stashed away enough cash.

You’re flying home from a wedding with your 6 year old. He’s old enough to sit through a flight, but not old enough to know, when exactly, to use his inside voice. You consider every year he is alive an upgrade. You ask him to wait while you get your boarding passes and low and behold the travel gods smile upon you and move you both to first class.

You settle in and as the flight attendant offers a basket full of Oreo cookies and other name brand snacks and your son cannot stop commenting on the Size of the Seats, you look around and realize you are the only one in first class traveling with a young child. He’s asking, loudly, for all the types of juices, and you watch around you as they pull out laptops and call up spreadsheets.  They order scotch and other small bottles. You have a Diet Coke and your son has an apple juice. And an orange juice. And a cranberry juice. And 3 Oreos.

 The plane hasn’t even taken off yet.

Take the upgrades. Go for the bigger picture, the better sound, the bigger room, the larger snack basket. Enjoy it. Tomorrow you will go back to the smaller apartment, the older car, the slower Internet speed. But today, today you have a choice.

To Resolutions

I resolve to right at least one wrong this year. This will work best if it’s someone else’s wrong and I get to get all righteous, which is also a wrong and I will fix that as well. Next year.

 

I’m going to become literate in something I know nothing about. Nothing difficult, like writing code, or time consuming, like knitting, or that requires expensive equipment, like astronomy or film cameras. No, something more esoteric like Victorian cures for TB or quantum string theory.

 

 Or Netflix.

I resolve to put myself in some situation that will feel uncomfortable to the point of pain, the “uncomfort zone.” I will do this every day for a year and write about it. Oh, wait…

I resolve to eat more kale. Even if I have to batter and deep fry it and wash it down with Jack Daniels. Seriously, I am going to make healthy choices. Even if I have to make 7 unhealthy ones to get there.

I resolve to be nicer if it kills me. It will. It will totally kill me. So, if at some point in the year when I can’t take it anymore--say, February--and I do something crazy like drive to Ecuador to escape, you’ll understand.

I resolve to be more patient and empathetic and generous. I resolve to listen more and talk less. I resolve to withhold judgement until I know all the facts. I resolve to run up all the hills and walk over all the eggshells.

I will write the great American novel in NANOWRIMO and then the great American memoir in December and will follow it up with poems and then a final volume bending all the genres. Oprah will ask me to be on her show but I will be too busy.

Resolutions don’t keep themselves, you know.