Every morning my husband and I walk the dog.
We chat during the walk.
Today we talked about words people say wrong and words people use incorrectly. We lead very exciting lives. He reads on TikTok every evening. Mostly fantasy novels. His TikTok handle is pop_reads in case you’re interested. The other night I was getting a cup of tea and I heard him say writhe with a short i sound. I said, “writhe” (With a long i) He corrected himself.
He and I have both found ourselves mispronouncing words over the years because we learned them from books and not from hearing other people say them. Never be embarrassed if you mispronounce a word. It shows you’re a reader.
This morning he suggested that I sit next to him every evening while he reads and correct his pronunciations. No, thanks. I have other things to do. Those Netflix series aren’t going to watch themselves!
As we walked, we talked about other words that folks get wrong.
I mentioned staunch vs. stanch and loathe vs. loath.
Staunch means loyal. Stanch is what you do when someone is bleeding and you hold a cloth over the wound. A lot of people say staunch when they mean stanch.
Loathe means hate. Loath means reluctant. You may loathe your neighbor, but be loath to let him know that.
We don’t always have these educational, highbrow chats. Sometimes we just complain about the weather.
Have you got any words that you mix up or do you have a funny story about a vocabulary faux pas?