“Never,” said Parler.
Together, they turned to the sentence. Parler provided the action, and Être provided the structure.
Parler tried again. “ Je all- ” He stopped. Aller wasn’t his friend. Aller was irregular. He couldn’t conjugate it.
For I spoke : “ J’ai parlé ,” they said together. (Using avoir – an irregular verb – plus the past participle of a regular verb). For I went : “ Je suis allé ,” they said. (Using être – the irregular verb – plus the past participle of the irregular verb aller ).
In the heart of Paris, on a quiet little street called Rue des Verbes , lived two very different neighbors.
Monsieur Parler stepped forward immediately. “Easy! Je parl- ” he began. But he froze. The action was in the past. He knew his past tense required an auxiliary verb, but he couldn't do it alone.
The two neighbors rarely spoke. Monsieur Parler thought Être was chaotic and unreliable. “Why can’t you just follow the pattern?” he would mutter, dusting his clean, regular and -re friends like Finir and Vendre .