T is for TENSE

          Looking at my letter list, I figured that this would probably be the “See Spot Run” entry, but that’s okay.  Twenty letters in and we’ve had a few tough ones, funny ones and brief ones.  Our alphabet is winding down fast.

            And verb tense determines in what time your narrator is speaking.  It basically determines if the action is currently happening, will happen in the future or has already occurred.


Simple Present:       She writes

Present Perfect:      She has written

Simple Past:             She wrote

Past Perfect:            She had written

Future:                      She will write

Future Perfect:        She will have written

            I think I got that right(?)  Honestly, verb conjugation intimidates the crap out of me.  All the perfects, participles, regular vs. irregular and subject-verb agreement makes me anxious.  With all those rules, there is too many ways to mess up.

   The best advice is to choose a tense and then play it by ear.  Children learn language by hearing and repeating; adults are the same way.

The only caution in writing is that you want to try to avoid passive language.  The verb “was” is an indicator of the passive “to be” when paired with a past participle.  An easier way to spot this—as a wise contest judge once taught me—is to search your word document for the term “was.”  If more than fifteen highlights pop up on the page, you’re using passive language.  It’s not officially wrong to write passive, it’s just that staying in the moment is the strongest way to hold your reader's attention.  You can write in the past tense and still be in the center of the action.

            Okay, this is the last toughy letter, I swear. 

If you come back tomorrow, we’re in for some fun—U is for the USUAL SUSPECTS.

            *heeheeheee*  Goodnight!