You Learned it Once? Learn it Again. This Way.

I just watched a video that featured an editor named Emily Brewster from Merriam-Webster. In said video, she said it's perfectly all right to end a sentence with a preposition.* For years, it's been driven into our heads that we CANNOT end a sentence with a preposition. How many sentences have we rewritten through the years based on this mythological grammar rule? Tens? Hundreds? Thousands?

What will this do for English students in grammar school, high school, and college? Will their teachers and professors know of this change? Do memos circulate in academia “As of today it is no longer an abomination to end a sentence with a preposition” or “From this day forward, a preposition is fine to end a sentence with”? What if said educator didn't get the memo? Are they going to put sensors in red pens so that when an educator attempts to mark points off for a sentence ended with a preposition, the pen beeps and says, “This is acceptable, keep that pen in check” or, “back away from the paper”?

Do you ever wonder how many things we've relearned through the years? For example, I'm not talking about Pluto starting as a planet, then being reclassified, now having the planet status being debated again. I'm talking about learning it one way, the rules changed, so you need to learn a different way.

Some things have finite rules, like computer programming. A misplaced dot is still going to create a glitch. I mean arbitrary rules, like the preposition thing, wearing white after Labor Day (once a major fashion don't, now it's fine), or growing up Catholic and being told you can't eat meat on Fridays, but now it's acceptable. How many of us still do it the way we were taught, regardless of current rules or dogma?

Having MS has made me relearn a bunch of things, or learn old things in a new way. Walking isn't automatic, and requires balance. You can get a good nights' sleep and still be exhausted. Motivation and energy are not the same. A balanced diet and exercise don't always keep you healthy. Chocolate really is a miracle drug, not just a delicious flavor. Just because it feels like it's raining doesn't mean it is raining. Hives are not always caused by an allergic reaction. You get the gist of what I mean.

We've all made adjustments through the years to accommodate what gets thrown at us. Giving myself a daily shot is a great example. If you would have told me 3 months ago that I'd be doing the stupid Copaxone every single day, I'd have laughed at you, really, really hard. I knew I'd never do shots again. Never. Ever. Now, I'm laughing at myself. It would have been extremely foolish (pig-headed, selfish, stubborn- insert adjective of your choice) to turn down $60K in free medicine. Copaxone runs about $5000 a month. No, I probably wouldn't have had to come up with 5K every month, there are assistance programs, but that would have meant delaying treatment even longer by the time all the paperwork was submitted and I was approved. I had $60,000 worth of medicine, sitting there, waiting for me to take it.

I guess that must be how one feels on Let's Make A Deal. There could be something better behind door #3, but you have a tangible prize worth something right in front of you. What do you do? I found out that I'd keep the prize, such as it is. 

*video is from 2011