go to

go to idiom
  1. See going to.
  2. Also, go toward. Contribute to a result, as in Can you name the bones that go to make the arms and legs? or The director has a good eye for seeing what will go toward an entire scene. [c. 1600]
  3. Begin, start, as in By the time she went to call, she'd forgotten what she wanted to say. The related idiom go to it means “get started, get going.” P.G. Wodehouse used it in Louder & Funnier (1932): “Stoke up and go to it.” [First half of 1700s]

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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