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Q&A What tense to use for events that are still happening?

The question is similar to this but the answers does not answer me. In my general fiction novel, which is told in first person singular past tense, I encounter moments where I am confused whether t...

1 answer  ·  posted 5y ago by codeNewbie‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by System‭

#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T12:19:53Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/46318
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar codeNewbie‭ · 2019-12-08T12:19:53Z (over 4 years ago)
The question is similar to [this](https://writing.stackexchange.com/questions/12561/can-i-change-between-the-use-of-past-tense-to-present-tense-for-the-story-being) but the answers does not answer me. In my general fiction novel, which is told in first person singular past tense, I encounter moments where I am confused whether to use present tense as the events are still happening as the story is being told.

For an example:

> Matt and Richard arrived just a few minutes later. Matt **was** the software architect and Richard the Creative Director who headed our team.

In this paragraph, Matt is still the software architect and Richard is still the Director as the story is being told. I am getting confused about usage of 'was', I tried to use ',' for Matt.

Using **'is'** is disturbing the flow of tenses in the paragraph.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2019-06-27T16:41:43Z (almost 5 years ago)
Original score: 1