second conditional

Hello there!

The topic of the second conditional has been bugging me for quite a while. Normally I use a standard version of it, namely: If I didn't know how to swim, I would ask a professional swimmer. --> In fact, I can swim.
BUT...
is there any chance that my sentences (by the way, all made up) would work in any context:
If I didn't come on Monday, would that have made any difference. --> It's Wednesday today.

My intended meaning is that I was there but I want to find out more about the consequences if I weren't there. Again I am not sure if weren't expresses what I mean. If I were ---> were (in its subjunctive mood) referes to now not to the past (or maybe not)

Too many ifs...

There is another sentence which I find wrong but you never know:
If I was/were finding a wallet, I would give it back. Can you think of any context in which this sentence would make sense. I cannot.

Hyperslow

Hi hyper!

I'm sorry, your
If I didn't come on Monday, would that have made any difference.
doesn't work, I'm afraid.

Let's say, as you suggest, that it's Wednesday today. In particular, let's say that it's Wednesday 2nd December.
If I didn't come on Monday would normally apply to the following Monday: Monday 7th December.
So you can't say If I didn't come on Monday, would that have made any difference? You need, instead: If I didn't come on Monday, would that make any difference?

Conversely, if you're talking about Monday 30th November, when you were actually there; and you're wondering whether not being there would have made a difference, what you want is: If I hadn't come on Monday, would that have made any difference?

Thank you Loob,
What about the other sentence:
If I was/were finding a wallet, I would give it back.

Hyperslow

I don't think I could use a continuous tense in that sentence, hyper.

Again, it would be a straightforward second conditional: If I found a wallet, I would give it back.

Or if you want to make the possibility more remote (but still second conditional): If I were to find a wallet, I would give it back.

That's interesting, I need to investigate it.

Thank you

Loob said:

I don't think I could use a continuous tense in that sentence, hyper.

👁 Thumbs Up :thumbsup:
You can't give it back while you are still finding it (and "finding a wallet" is a process which probably doesn't take any time - as soon as you see it, it is "found").

There is one, admittedly very unusual, circumstance in which one might just say If I didn't come on Monday, would that have made any difference?

This is a mixed II/III conditional, which is used when we are describing ongoing circumstances in relation to a past event.

What is the ongoing circumstance here? My habitually coming on Monday.

So the question is asking whether or not, if I was in the habit of coming on some day other than Monday, that would, on some particular occasion in the past, have made any difference.

The circumstances in which one might say this are so unusual, and so far from those described in the OP, that I think Loob was right to dismiss it. Apart from anything else, we'd be more likely to say If I didn't come on Monday in such a context.

The mixed II/III conditional is more often used in cases like If you were not blind, you would have gone on that dreadful journey.

Ongoing circumstance? - your being blind.
Previous event - your not going on that dreadful journey.