There you are, writing to that boy you like so much. He went on a trip and you haven’t seen him for weeks. You have missed him a lot and you want him to know it. You want to write him the perfect note; but you have a problem. How do you write to him that you miss him? With or without h? miss or miss?
Why is it important for you to write correctly to miss? First, your note won’t look very pretty with misspellings. Second, you don’t want to appear uneducated in front of that handsome guy. And third, you want him to understand exactly what you want to express to him. Come on! That all these reasons are valid: be it aesthetic, educational or linguistic.
We are going to help you write your love message correctly. Let the boy be happy when he receives it. Here we will explain everything to you, so that you never again have any uncertainty about the use of the verb to throw. That way, when you write a love letter again, you won’t throw the crumpled pages in the trash. We will explain its etymology, its meaning and its uses. Now, to clarify your doubts!
Instructions to write miss
- You may have noticed that earlier we wrote cast. So, you already know that this is the correct spelling of the word.
- Let’s start by learning why you don’t write echar with h, how to do. Easy, cast is not part of the verbal paradigm of doing, it is a different verb.
- Echar, belongs to the first conjugation (verbs ending in -ar); and hacer, to the second (verbs ending in –er ). There is no reason for you to confuse them.
- The verbs cast and do come from Latin; from iactare, the first; de facĕre, the second.
- Both casting and doing have multiple meanings, let’s focus on the main ones. Echarmeans on the one hand to throw or launch; and on the other, strutting. As for doing, the first meaning that comes to mind is to produce.
- Now let’s think about the uses that may raise doubts. We can focus on three: done/done, done/done, and done/done.
- First, we find the noun fact. For example, a journalist can tell us the facts related to an accident. So as not to get confused, just try putting an article before echo, or pluralizing it, in I miss you, and you’ll see that it doesn’t make sense.
- Secondly, we use a lot of fact to indicate the origin of a product: Made in Spain. But we can also write Hecha por María or Hechas por Rosa . Why can it appear in masculine, feminine, singular or plural? Because we are facing a passive form. It means ‘has(have) been made somewhere or by someone’.
- Thirdly, fact is the participle of the verb to have and we use it in compound tenses, for example in I have made dinner . Look closely, it always appears with the auxiliary have
- How do we make the compound tenses of cast? You will never write sentences like: *I have done less, or *I have made the salt in the soup; but I have missed you and I have added salt to the soup.
- Now let’s compare the participles of the two verbs. The participle of doing, is done; the one to cast, is cast. There is no possible confusion.
- Now, let’s get to know cast, a very versatile verb. We can find it in many contexts, with different uses.
- When it appears as the main verb, cast is a transitive verb. As examples, we have to throw: the garbage in the basket, more sugar in the coffee or a stranger in the house .
- It can be part of a verbal periphrasis. Echar is there an auxiliary verb that accompanies some intransitive verb. Its value is inchoative, because it is used to indicate the beginning of the action expressed by the main verb. So in the example she went to sleep, we have that she went to sleep recently. As you can see, between the auxiliary verb and the main one, there is the preposition “a”.
- Finally, it can also be part of a transitive verbal locution, such as echar de menosor echa en falta. These expressions mean, ‘to feel the absence of something or someone’, or ‘to miss something or someone’. It is the same to say Juan misses María, than Juan misses María.
- At some point, echar menos was used, without the preposition. Don’t worry though. The Pan-Hispanic Dictionary of Doubts declares it out of use for more than two centuries.
- Now, let’s see where the expression miss comes from. Its origin is credited to achar less than Portuguese; but don’t be confused, if you check a dictionary of that language, achar means ‘find or find’
What do you need to write miss?
- Someone to miss.
- The Pan-Hispanic Dictionary of Doubts can help you a lot to clarify this uncertainty. He pays special attention to the verb to cast.
- Read about spelling regularly.
Tips for writing miss
- You know: do, with h; cast, without h.
- If you feel doubts again, think about the infinitive of the verb. In I miss you, he thinks of casting (first conjugation); and in I make you the food, in hacer (second conjugation).
- Never put an h to cast. It doesn’t matter in what context: that you miss, missing, to sleep, sugar to coffee. Do not hesitate.
- Whenever you miss someone, do it without h.