War of the Vowels 

        As one who spent decades wrestling with the written word, I stumbled upon trouble in the arena of spoken words. Curious, I left my keyboard, grabbed my tape recorder and approached the hostile combatants. 

     There are five vowels, although y can be a vowel also. The five are extremely proud, being essential in their contribution to a language dominated by 21 consonants. 

     I found the vowels arguing, each claiming to be superior to the others. 

     For example, the vowel a is in the very center of "war," a reason for pride if there ever was one. 

     I don't worship multi-syllable words like snooty college professors do. My language level is suited to this task - to unite the fractured a/e\i/o\u family. 

     First, I approached the letter i, which answered "Hi." So far so good. But every attempt at conversation, i just repeated "is it?" The others had a similar response. Each vowel refused to use a word that included another vowel. The survival of the English language was at stake. 

     I searched for what they had in common. The scale! - do re mi fa so la ti do. My elation evaporated when I learned that e had replaced i. They sound the same, but i was livid. 

     And a replaced e, which had twice replaced i. The letter o appears in more than 40 percent of two-letter English words - our field of study. Others were jealous, and o wasn't willing to share. 

     We must unite the vowels in the interest of saving our language and the world. But, no promises. 

 Tomorrow