getting

Pluralgettings (some meanings)

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of get.

   Getting to the airport early spared us the long security lines.

   He spent the whole morning getting the house ready for guests.

   Note

   One spelling does two jobs, with the t doubled before -ing. After a form of be it builds the progressive (she is getting tired). Standing alone, it works as a verbal noun (getting there took an hour). It carries every meaning of get: obtaining, receiving, fetching, becoming, causing to become, as in getting ready or getting the house clean. Once it takes an article, as in the getting of wealth, it has become the noun of acquiring.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The act of obtaining or acquiring something.

   The getting of wealth often demands sacrifices elsewhere in life.

   In business, the getting of new clients matters as much as keeping the old ones.

   Similaracquisition, gaining

   Note

   A noun of action that usually comes with a possessive or an of-phrase: thy getting, the getting of wealth. The King James Bible of 1611 sets it beside its own verb in "With all thy getting, get understanding," so the line turns acquisition back on itself. That pairing gives the word a proverbial ring. Outside such set phrasing, acquisition is the plainer equivalent.

3. 3
   nouncountable or uncountable

   Whatever someone has obtained or acquired, especially gain or profit.

   After a dry summer, the farm's whole getting barely covered the winter feed.

   His gettings from the market stall went into a tin under the bed.

   Similargain, profit, earnings, takings, proceeds

   Note

   The result rather than the act: where the act of acquiring names the obtaining, this names what ends up in hand. It works both as a mass noun and as a countable plural, and the plural gettings is the natural way to speak of earnings that build up over time. Charlotte Riddell's "Old Mrs Jones" (1882) sets a woman's eagerness to increase her gettings against her failure to save them.

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