Preposition II
The devil is in the details. Why would he hide there? In the infinitesimally small. On the other hand, the divine teacher of the gospels said, “He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much.” Sounds to me that God is hiding in the details too. Ahha! That’s where I was going wrong. I have been trying to get you pumped UP about the majesty of language by extolling its infinite capacity. Instead, I will focus on the tiniest parts of our English grammar. Prepare to listen to the most boring speech ever to escape from this tiny, squinchy mouth to your discerning ears.
Articles—A, AN, THE—are too small for me to consider. Barely worth key-strokes. Rather, we will focus on the second-most small—prepositions. You know, words that introduce phrases that tell us about time and space. It would be easier if we pronounced the word PREpositions, meaning “before the place.” In the house, in a day or two, by the riverside, by 1 o’clock this afternoon his speech will surely have vanished from my mind, over the bridge, over an hour from now, from your hometown, from yourtime of birth….Time and Place.
But to me that’s not the most incredible, yes I say incredible, function of a PREposition. You know, when I go to the computer to send and email and I hit J….do you know what happens….Jahna, Janet, Jason, Josh…your names come up, along with others. How many things have to go right from the beginning of my thought, to my fingers placed on the keyboard, and all the charges running through my laptop, and then out into infinite space in order for the message to get to you? A speech for….That is how incredible Prepositions are!
They change the meaning of VERBS. A little word like a PREposition alters the action of the verb. I’m sure you’ve noticed that, right? Wait, you know what VERBS are….the words in a sentences that indicate the action taking place….these tiny, practically throw-away, biodegradable parts of speech, PREpositions, so small, change the meaning of verbs…..
Let’s take the verb TAKE for example….
When you Take On something you are assuming an opinion, assuming a pose, engaging in a task
When you Take In something you are gathering something, like information, an aroma from the kitchen
When you Take After someone you resemble that person in looks or manners
When you Take Up something you are learning a hobby like knitting, playing chess,
When you Take Away something you either stolen something or have gained something like knowledge
Oh, my god, this is diabolical. Did you hear that? TAKE AWAY. What is your take-away from the training? Did you hear the preposition AWAY turn the verb take into a NOUN. Let’s go get some Take-Out. The Take-Off is scheduled for two.
Words like Hold-out, Start-up, Kick-back, Break-up….all Nouns made out of a verb and a Preposition. How can this be? This shakes us to our cores, does it not?
Let me Take you into my confidence. I have 12 more examples of the verb Take with prepositions. But you don’t Take me For a fool do you….i can tell that you are Catching On, Getting with it….yes, you can do the Verb-Preposition wild thing with other verbs like Turn, Make, Run, Hold, Bring, Catch, Get….my faves are Make up, make off with, make out, make over, and Turn off, on, down, and apple Turn Over…..
I have just two questions….how did you learn to do this? because each of you do it all day long, like breathing, and you don’t even think about it…just like breathing. Did your fourth grade teacher ask you to pull out your grammar book to Chapter III on how Prepositions change the meaning of verbs and how Prepositions can even turn them into nouns. And question two, who was the first person to think about even doing this? Or was it an evil cabal of English teachers possessed by the demon in charge of temporal punishment?
Maybe it is like the involuntary function of breathing. The idea is in the air and we just speak it out of our tiny, squinchy mouths. If so, our language skill set is among the most unbelievable artificial intelligence systems ever produced. Look up artificial….it means produced by man, not by nature. Language is supernatural. By practicing something like modern English, all day long for the last 6 centuries, other humans by speaking to us, by writing to us, have given us the incredible AI of language.
Now, people don’t watch you breathe, but they do listen to you speak. So, what is our Take-Away from all this. If we are faithful in that which is least, like listening to how we use words, especially PRE-positions, then we will be faithful in that which is much—like relating to people through words, and giving speeches at Toastmasters. We take it on faith…..hear that, take it ON faith that when we open our mouths, our thoughts will have arranged themselves in an order another person can make sense of. But it is an act of commitment to the so many things that have to go just right that brings the angels out.