This holiday season of stress seems an appropriate time to talk about angst and whether that noun can be used as a verb, which I once allowed in the pages of National Geographic.

Pressing nouns into action as verbs is a perfectly good tradition in English. For instance, the noun mill according to Merriam-Webster's dates from before the 12th century, whereas the verb to mill from 1511.

Sometimes the process is the reverse, as in the case of swim. The verb dates from the 12th century, the noun from 1599, and the adjective (as in "a swim meet") only from 1924.

One of my favorite usage guides, Strunk and White's Elements of Style, says, "Many nouns have lately been pressed into service as verbs. Not all are bad, but all are suspect." It then goes on to mention gift, host, chair, headquarter, and debut. Of these examples, only gift as a verb raises my eyebrow (sorry, fund-raisers); the others seem entirely natural and correct as verbs.

If either Strunk or White were writing today, I’m sure impact would be included as a particularly suspect verb. Although the use of impact as a verb is ubiquitous, I am resisting the impact of popular use and will continue to use the word only as a noun.

Which brings me to angst, an English noun dating from circa 1942 (borrowed from German) and definitely not natural and correct as a verb.  When I let it be used that way in National Geographic, it was with a certain amount of hand-wringing, but also with a sensitivity to the writer's style. It appeared in an article on poisons, by Cathy Newman, one of our staff writers, and read: "As if everyday poisons are not enough to angst over, there are nature's more exotic hazards."

Ms. Newman now asks, "Is it time for 'angst' The Verb, to take its place in the Official StyleMaven Lexicon of Usage?" I think not. But it may happen some day.

When I started this blog, I promised to talk about the subjunctive. I’ve put it off long enough. So, here goes.

I frequently read that the subjunctive is dying out, but I don’t think that is necessarily true, even though it doesn’t seem to be taught much in schools anymore except in foreign-language classes. Somehow, though, most people use the subjunctive mood correctly for certain idioms, for statements of wishing, for statements that are contrary to fact.

Let’s start with statements contrary to fact.

The mother of a teenager is not thinking subjunctive when she stands in the doorway of his bedroom (I use “his” from personal experience, not because I’m insensitive) and says, “If I were you, I’d clean up the room now!” In this exclamation “were” is subjunctive.

Usually with “I” as a subject, we’d say “am” or “was”: I was angry yesterday when I saw your room, and I am still angry today.”  This sentence is in the indicative mood, a straight statement of fact.

When a statement is not only hypothetical, but also most likely impossible (there is little chance that the mother will become her son), the subjunctive form of the verb is called for. Same thing in “If I were king,” unless perhaps your name is Charles.

Of course, it is not always easy determining when a statement is contrary to fact (subjunctive needed) and when it’s merely presenting a possibility (indicative needed). Not all sentences beginning with “if” require subjunctive (“If I was talking too loudly, I’m sorry”). Others definitely do (“If I were to live my life over again, I would learn how to play the piano”). And some could go either way, usually depending on how formal the writer or speaker is (If it weren’t/wasn’t for her good humor, we’d all be in trouble).

I think it is sentences such as this last one that lead people to think the subjunctive is dying. At one time there was little choice in the world of proper speech. Subjunctive was required. Today our speech is less formal and in sentences that are not strictly hypothetical, indicative is often used. In fact, the subjunctive sounds odd to many of our ears.

Which leads me to words in the blog of National Geographic’s Editor, Chris Johns: “Williams Lake, British Columbia—a buckaroo town if there ever was one.” That blog received a comment from “a faithful reader if ever there were one,” saying that even though NG does not stand for National Grammar, the Editor should use proper grammar and should have used “the subjunctive tense” when making a conditional statement.

Either “was” or “were” is correct to my thinking—and that of many other wordsmiths today. The use depends on how formal you want to be. The statement is not really contrary to fact; Williams Lake is a buckaroo town, one among many. The Editor is being emphatically informal, and that’s the way he wants to be in his blog. Faithful reader is apparently more formal, and that’s fine too. He should, though, not refer to the subjunctive as a tense. The subjunctive is a mood.

Whether this recent trend of using the indicative rather than subjunctive is a result of ignorance or a loosening of formal grammar, as forms of communication expand and include a broader segment of the population, is hard to say. It could well be both. But it has been an established and accepted use—at least by many—for a while now, and I see no return to the subjunctive any time soon in these constructions.

There are, however, still situations in which the subjunctive must be used. I will get to some of those in future blogs.