for the life of me, it won't send an email when i use the form
Maybe it is sending, but you're just not receiving it. There's a whole Internet between the two.
You need an email log: https://wordpress.org/plugins/postman-smtp/
And you might need to verify your SPF record: http://www.codingmonkey.ca/my-contact-form-emails-are-not-being-sent-to-yahoo-hotmail-gmail/