Actually, it is not my sentence at all. This sentence belongs to a person
whose name is Siraisi Tomio. And I think that we have to move on because
conversation about "can" or "could" or even about this lonely child makes me
want to unsubscribe this listserve.
Respectfully yours, Aram

----- Original Message -----
From: "Candace Davies" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, September 20, 2000 9:48 AM
Subject: Re: Verb form of if-subjunctive


> The way to solve the problem is to find someone the child can play with.
LOL
>
> Candace
>
> Aram Mrktychev wrote:
>
> > "(1)The little child is lonely; he would be happier if he had someone
> > that he can play with."
> >
> > I'm trying to understand what "can" or "could" has something to do with
a
> > subjunctive mood in this sentence because all I see here is that word
> > "would" only determines a subjunctive mood. The only reason why it is
not
> > clear and people got stocked on words "can" and "could" is because in
this
> > sentence essential phrase " he would be happier " stands before "if."
I'm
> > not sure if there is any standard form of sentences exists for each
rule,
> > but it is more comfortable for me to see a subjunctive mood here if you
will
> > rephrase this sentence a little bit: "The little child is lonely; if he
had
> > someone to play with, he would be happier." But I definitely won't use
> > "that" for the relative clause. Also I want to say that "can" and
"could" in
> > this sentence don't sound wrong because we got used to listen to many
errors
> > in modern spoken English that we are just simply having hard time to
define
> > what is wrong and what is right. When millions of people speak in an
> > improper way it is kind of hard to say that everyone of them is wrong.
> > Respectfully yours, Aram
>