Some days some days

How it works

English splits the idea of “not never, but not dated.” “Some days” points at a repeating, incomplete set: some days the train is late; some days it is not. “Someday” points at one unnamed future time: someday I will open that drawer. “Some day” as two words can also mean a particular day that you have not pinned down yet, often with a relative clause: some day next month, some day after the exam.

The doubled title “some days some days” is the search catching itself. People type the pair because they have heard both and want the difference. There is no third holiday called Some Days. There is no feast that lands on two squares. It is a grammar fork wearing a calendar hat.

If you can replace the phrase with “on certain days,” you want “some days.” If you can replace it with “at an unknown future time,” you want “someday.” If you can replace it with “a day I have not chosen,” “some day” as two words will usually fit.

Some day and someday

Some day someday is the same fork written in a hurry. One word is an adverb. Two words keep “day” as a noun you could still date. You can say “someday soon” as a wish. You can say “on some day in June” as a placeholder on a planner. You cannot put “someday” on a grid as if it were a Thursday.

Writers drop the space because the wish is one thought. Planners keep the space because a day is a thing you can still name. Neither spelling is a mood. Both are instructions to the reader about whether a date exists yet.

some days — a subset of days, often repeating. some day — a particular day not yet chosen. someday — an unspecified future time, not a calendar square. every day — each day, no days left out. one day — a single day, past or future, still a noun.

“One day” can be a story opening in the past. “Someday” is not used that way. “Some days” is not a promise. It is a partition of the week or the year into days that behave one way and days that do not.

Putting the words on a calendar

A recurring reminder belongs to “some days”: Tuesdays and Fridays, or days when the office is open. A wish without a date belongs to “someday” and should not steal a numbered square. When the wish grows a date, it stops being someday and becomes a day. Move it onto the grid and drop the adverb.

People delay work by parking it in someday. The calendar cannot defend a square that was never chosen. If the task matters, pick some day — two words — and write the number. If it does not matter yet, leave it in a list that is not the diary. Mixing the two is how a wish pretends to be a plan.

Someday is a waiting room. Some day is a date you still owe a number. Some days is a pattern you could already mark in ink. Read your own sentence aloud. If you gestured at a cluster of past Tuesdays, you meant some days. If you gestured at a fog ahead, you meant someday. If you gestured at a blank box in June, you meant some day. The words are small. The calendar cares which one you used.