Question e-mailed by Miss Mae (March 13, 2011): Dear Mr. Carillo,
Good day, Sir!
I just wondered. In your post replying to a question I sent by e-mail last week,
'A Forum member’s comments on GMA 7’s ‘concised reporting’,” you changed “we are subscribing” to “we subscribe.” I thought the past progressive tense works just fine in that sentence.
Here is that part of my letter:
I tried to look for a copy of that commercial for your review but was not able to find one. Unfortunately too, we are subscribing to a different cable program to record one; I just happen to be in somebody else's house that day.
And here is the edited version:
I tried to look for a copy of that commercial for your review but was not able to find one. Unfortunately, too, we subscribe to a different cable program so I was not able to make a tape-recording of that TV ad. (I just happened to be in somebody else’s house that day when I saw that ad.)
Of course, I do not have any doubt that you were right. I just wish to understand what I thought I had done properly.
Respectfully,
Miss Mae
My reply to Miss Mae:Dear Miss Mae,
In English, the present progressive form of an intransitive verb like “subscribe” very often conveys intent or a plan to do or undertake something in the immediate future. When we say “We are subscribing to
The Manila Times,” for example, the sense is that of the future tense “We will subscribe to
The Manila Times sometime soon” and not the continuing sense of the present tense “We subscribe to
The Manila Times.” For this reason, if we receive the service of a cable-TV provider regularly on order, we don’t say “
We are subscribing to a different cable-TV provider” (which means you intend to change your cable-TV provider with another one) but say “
We subscribe to a different cable-TV provider” instead.
With my best wishes,
Joe Carillo
