Hit by a Semi.

Last night, a few moments before I was about to power down and retire, I ran across an article called Semicolons: A Love Story. I was naturally intrigued, but decided to hold off reading it at the time to savor it instead with my morning coffee. However, as daylight broke, my sweet anticipation quickly turned bitter when I realized that the article centered on Kurt Vonnegut’s view that the semicolon should not be used at all.

As I read, I began to experience a slight discomfort. I’ve become quite fond of the semicolon, especially over the past months, and I was not feeling at all ready to cut it out of my life—despite what seemed to be a sound reasoning. To my relief, the article ended not in favor or Mr. V. Whew.

A short-lived whew it was, though. I read the article again. I made note of the author’s lack of semicolon use, particularly in places where I’d become accustomed to inserting them. I felt my blood thin a little and drain slowly from my face. I’d been having this nagging feeling for awhile, and now it seemed to be very probable: I was wrong.

At one time, not so long ago, I’d had a pretty confident grasp on correct semicolon use, and often both doubtlessly and mercilessly edited them into and out of others’ writing. And then I read something, somewhere that indicated that I should and must place one in front of every but that presented itself to me. And so I did. Every time. From that day forward. I must have had a good reason to trust my source, though today I cannot find any record of the actual cognitive transaction that took place.

 

What I did find was an overwhelming amount of evidence that what I have been doing is totally incorrect, except for a rare 1% of the time. Visions of all the print pieces I approved, each boldly broadcasting my errant mark, flashed through my mind, and I figuratively died a mortified death for each one.

Seriously, this is really embarrassing.