"se me olvidaba decirte que… ", "se" functions as?

Question

Hi, "se me olvidaba decirte que… ", "se" functions as?

I think this has to do with "El dativo de interés" -it's kinda a Pandora's box though - daphne505, Nov 20, 2010

Answer 1

What Lazarus said.

Olvidarse is reflexive. I forget = me olvido.

But olvidaba is ambiguous.. It could be I/he/she/it forgot. And so is me. It could be several types of pronoun. Me olvidaba could be I forgot or someone forgot me.

So you toss in se to clear things up.

Or you could just accept the fact that that's the way they say it and stop worrying.

Thank you,to accept the way it was - Lancefox, Oct 2, 2010

Answer 2

I can give you a grammatical answer, but before I do, can you give an answer to a similar question in Spanish? Probably not.

"Me olvidaba decirte..." = Someone forgot me to tell you... (yes, it is nonsense)

"Se me olvidaba decirte..." = I forgot to tell you... (yes, it is nonsense)

Before I began to translate from English to Spanish, I used to ask myself these sort of questions, but I stopped wondering about them once I decided that grammar is useless.

I don't deal in grammar, i deal in communication. But if there r rules there, i follow them; if this is exception, i accept it. I wondered if there is a rule in that sentence, and i asked that question. Thank you, - Lancefox, Oct 2, 2010

Answer 3

"it" - "I forgot to tell it to you." Follow this link to the Reference section and read about direct and indirect pronouns...among other things.

link text

Answer 4

Kevin's right... so the correct way... that most people say is "se me olvidó decirte" ... I forgot to tell you

It's a little confusing... but it's what most people say... as though they say "I forgot" and imply that, everyone forgets...

me olvidaba and se me olvidó, sounds the same to me. But most people say the latter

Answer 5

OK I´m going to toss in my two cents here:

Like everyone else said, "se me olvidó" means, in english, "I forgot" You can also say "me olvidé" for "I forgot."

"se me olvidó" is more like "it was forgotten from me" (doesn't make sense in english, I know), much like "se me cayó" (I dropped it) means literally, "it fell from me."

"se" is often used in unplanned situations like that when something happens "from" you, and that's what it means in your case.

The imperfect tense "olvidaba" is the part that gives it the "almost" sense.

Se me olvidaba decirte is literally: "It was almost forgotten from me to tell you" but a better translation is: "I almost forgot to tell you..."

Answer 6

The function of "se" in this sentence means like "almost"

"I almost forget to tell you that..."

Does it makes sense to you?   It's close.