Was living/used to live
Hi, there
Should I say “I used to take” or “I was taking” in the following sentence?
“When I was 21, I was taking/ I used to take a course in Harvard - I lived in Boston - and one day I got in a car accident on Campus...”
Thank you
Recherche parmi différents professeurs en Anglais…
Réponses · 4
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As Dr. B mentioned "was taking" is correct.
We use the past continuous for something which happened before and after another action or for something that happened before and after a specific time (when I was 21 ... one day).
"Used to" is used when we talk about things that happened in the past (habits) but don’t happen anymore.
I hope this helps.
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"Was taking" means there was one action that lasted pretty long. If you say "used to take" it will mean you performed the action several times and it was a regular one for you at that time.
Have a look at these examples:
I was reading a book when you phoned. (At that time the action was in progress and it's a single action you refer to)
I used to read a lot when I was younger. ( Reading was a regular repeated action in the past, but it doesn't happen now, at least you don't read as much as you did in the past)
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Was taking
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