May or Might Is Right?

As I've grown older, I've learned a few things--and forgotten many things more. The latter is pathetic. This morning, for example, I was updating my journal and was getting ready to make a note about one of the books I'm currently reading, Russell Banks' Cloudsplitter, his novel about Hudson's own John Brown.

And between the time I left my chair where I was reading in the family room and my study,  I could not remember Banks' name. Had to Google. (At least it's easier now than in earlier generations to "recall" something you can't.)

I also notice that I'm learning things I never knew--or relearning things that I've forgotten I knew.

Here's a recent example. One day not long ago I started (why?) thinking about may and might. Maybe it's because the month of May has just begun?

And I thought about this: We compose sentences like I may go to the store and I might go to the store and use them interchangeably. But is one of them actually wrong? Do they mean two different things?

Now I do know, of course, that might can be the past tense of may.

• You may do well on the test if you study for it.
• You might have done well on the test if you'd studied for it.

But that doesn't help with the going-to-the-store sentences I mentioned earlier.

Now, I'm pretty sure that back in 6th grade or so I learned the difference. I might (!) even have gotten the question(s) correct on the worksheets and quizzes. (My strategy was not to study but to remember how my mom said it!)

But now--for the life of me--I could not tell you which is correct, which not.

[Pause for Google.]

And--lo and behold--there is a difference between them!

May indicates that you're fairly certain you'll do whatever; might, that you're less likely to do so.

• Sometimes the distinction is obvious.
• I may go to the store today.
• I might take a trip to Mars.
• Sometimes it's subtle.
• I may go to the store today.
• I might go to the store today.

There are other words that have similar differences that my public school teachers used to try to pour into me: will and shall; lie and lay; etc.

Some stayed; some leaked out.

And, of course, as the years have gone on, many such distinctions have faded from common discourse, have disappeared from much speaking and writing. Language changes all the time, and quite a few rules-that-were are now rules-that-aren't.

And you must remember that we made it all up, so it's bound to change--for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it's cultural changes. When I was a young man, for example, it was "correct" to say a sentence like this: Each student brought his books. Then it changed: Each student brought his or her books. And now--and I see this construction in published articles and books: Each student brought their books.

I try to avoid this particular hassle by making such constructions plural and by using their. All the students brought their books.

I now frequently see constructions like this: He is taller than me (instead of taller than I).

I see the distinctions between whoever and whomever, between who and whom disappearing--or in a fashion we call hypercorrection--i.e., using whom and whomever because they sound grammatically correct, though they often aren't:

• Give the candy to whomever asks for it.
• Nope: should be whoever there because it's the subject of its own clause; the entire clause, not a single word, is the object of the preposition to.

Or: He gave the books to him and I. (Nope: to him and me.) 

I could go on. But I'm getting bored. So I may/might quit right here.