OPINION / HUMOR – Silent 'G' and silent 'K' can kiss my gkbutt

English ain't easy, but I prefer it, mostly because I speak it

OPINION / HUMOR – At one point in my life (maybe almost 20 years ago) I seriously considered going to South Korea to teach English.  

But then, my brain did what it does best, and I started thinking about the silent “G” and silent “K” and I just didn’t have the energy, nor the knowledge, to explain that. 

I could just imagine the confusion on the faces of Koreans when learning the spelling of English words, taught by a young man from North Carolina with a Southern accent.

The letter G is pronounced jee, but the sound one automatically makes is Guh Guh… Gee, Guhh… 

And how is it pronounced? 

Well, since English isn’t a natural language, one fraught with turmoil, created by conquerors time, after time, in its formation, full of Celtic, Roman-Latin, Germanic / Scandinavian, and French influences, eventually after you combine all those ingredients, you get the English language. 

(Lots of “G’s” pronounced in words: English language) 

It’s one to be learned through a lifetime.  Or at least through schooling days. 

But what really gnaws at me is all the times such a hard letter is so silent in a word… just gnaws and gnaws… G is a gnarly letter, one that is designed to confuse and ignite a string of ghostly weight as it annoys us like gnats in the night air.  

It’s the anti-paradigm of linguistics that gnaws away at the very thought of it bellowing from our diaphragm as we breath from our lungs. 

The “G” makes about as much sense as any benign sound that aligns with the foreign influence of a feign purpose that reigns our language. 

….. imagine explaining that to a classroom full of non English speaking pupils, while I wait for the light from deep in the night of their brain to turn bright with the sudden understanding of the letter G. 

I just couldn’t do it; teaching English in South Korea - much less anywhere - was out of the question for me. 

But just to be sure, as I almost came to the conclusion, while I grabbed the gnarled knob of the door to the office, I felt a sharp pain like a knife and remembered the letter K was also fraught with chaos and confusion. 

As I knit a knot in my brain, this campaign of thought was when I knew I couldn’t teach English to anyone. 

My knuckles white, my knickers in a knot, I let this idea tie such a knot in my stomach, I just had to know if I knew enough knowledge to properly teach English anywhere. 

As my knees buckled and my knuckles tightened I realized I had let such little knock-knack thoughts attack my thoughts of these silent but deadly G’s and K’s and in that moment, as I kneaded bread to make a loaf from dough to eat with my knackwurst cooking in the oven, I decided to go to California and leave these utter useless thoughts to die in a ghastly manner and bring my thoughts back from the wreck they had created - wait… wreck ?  They “w” is silent!? 

I had no time to wrestle with another letter that makes absolutely no sense in certain words - I was suddenly distracted by the sound of my pipes in my kitchen as I realized I needed a plumber — and that the “b” in plumber is actually silent and not due to my southern accent — there was no way I was even going to remotely ever try to teach English in another country, especially since, when asked, I could say the only letter that is always pronounced is “V” and no word ends in V, always add a “e.” 

No doubt, teaching wasn’t for me — oh crap, doubt — the b is silent? 

Don't be duped, doubt is a silent b. 

I was aghast at this, just thinking about it was gnarly.  

And wasn’t even going to try to reach any conclusions on how “c” is pronounced… 

The … deCission … to be a teacher faded with the day as it turned into niGht. Knight? — no, night.  Good grief. 

So, I decided I’d just try to be a writer instead.