measi's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Je sprechen rooskie Most people are born with some sort of inate gift... for something. Some people are athletic. Some are natural healters. Some are business savvy. Some are just people who brighten the days of others. The gift might not be something that our society considers essential, or even worthwhile, but everyone has a little ability that they are programmed to do. But unfortunately not everyone is enthusiastic or encouraged to develop that gift, and many people lose touch with it when they are still children, never to see it return. In my case, my gift has always centered around the use of language. Since I learned how to form letters, I've been writing. Whether it's the backwards "S"-es carefully drawn as part of my name on the inside corner of my books as a 5-year-old, or the penpals that I've avidly kept in touch with for the majority of my life, I've been writing. It's not that I love to write. Well, I do sometimes. But it goes deeper. I literally NEED to write. Screw the proper grammar and punctuation, despite my attempts at writing with some sort of prowess. Writing keeps me going. It's my preferred form of communication and my life's blood for energy. Ask any of my friends who have gone through rounds of hard times with me. If you need me to express myself, ask me to write a letter. I'm better at it than speaking anyday. But my gift with language doesn't stop there... it's also a love of language. Of how grammar is put together, of how languages are put together. Language to me is a beautiful artform, complex and simple at the same time. And as a lover of fine languages, it has been my desire to try to learn as many as I can in my lifetime. No, I don't need them. I just want to learn them. I'm a weird duck that way. At some point in my life, I've had formal education in (in this order) German, French, Russian, and Spanish. Out of the four, the only one that I can speak somewhat fluently is French, and that needs some brushing up since I really haven't used it in a few years. Heck, my last year of high school was evidence that I was a language and communication nut. My schedule consisted of English (required), Government (required), the school newspaper, French, Russian, and band. What further evidence was needed? But just as it did in high school, that burning need to crack a textbook has returned. Maybe it's the autumn air and one of those carryovers from grade school days, I don't know. But it's there, and it's pegging me to do something about it. So I'm walking down Boylston Street on Friday after giving platelets, and I get to Copley Square and the looming building with all of the great classical authors' names chisled into the side of the building. I realized that as winter approaches and those cold nights become commonplace, I'm going to be staying inside more and more. I need something that will keep me from just plopping in front of the TV. So I went to the public library over the weekend and picked up a couple books with Russian exercises (I already have my high school textbook at home) and one on German. Then went to CVS and got myself a spiffy new notebook (they have these black binders that you can decorate with gel pens now. They're hideously girly... I love it), and have cracked open the books. Yes, I know I'm insane. Particularly for tackling two languages at the same time. Although at this point, Russian is more of recalling than new learning 'cause I actually did know this stuff... I just needed refreshers on the first few chapters. (Plus my wrist refuses to cooperate with me in making some of the Cyrillic letters in cursive... but we won't get into that clumsiness). But every couple of years I get this huge desire to re-educate myself somewhere, and languages are the first place I look, because it's a subject I'm genuinely interested in. Will I get far with this? Who knows. But it's fun, and it's getting some of those educational cobwebs out of my brain. --Mel. 9:54 p.m. - 27 September 2001 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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