June Nash

Could Do

Need to sort what I must do.

Things in queue are not a few.

Some for fun and those that must.

Schedule full, think seams will bust.

 –

Pick up a bit here and there.

Write down, make list with care.

To make list of have to dos

Gives sour mood and the blues.

 –

So I write down stuff as coulds.

Makes more likely to be woulds.

Don’t like shoulds, even from me,

So suggest quite casually.

 –

I could cook, home made, great taste,

Or eat out, not good, cash waste.

To exercise class could go,

Or stay at home, let flab grow.

 –

These are choices, things I choose.

These choices show goods could lose,

If languor over comes will.

Though lounging will oft win still.

 –

So I make list nice and long

Start music, work list to song.

If got done only small part

Still ahead from where I start.

June Nash

I am always over loaded with things I should do.  Should is a term that implies an obligation, not a choice.  I prefer to have choices in my life. A friend of mine read somewhere that the root of the word was scold.  I could not verify that anywhere, but feel that there is a scolding quality to the word.  I listened to yet another friend who suggested that I could remove the word should from my vocabulary altogether, replace it with could.  I like that idea!  

How about you?  Do you ever use the word should?  Can it be replaced by could?