Hour good luck to be razed hear. Eye am a lcuky dog.

 When I was younger, I had to learn, what in school, was classified , "foreign language".   In High School I took Spanish. In College I took French.

In life, I lived in Israel, and tried to learn Hebrew.

The picture on the left was around that time. And yes, that is what my hair looks like when it's not ironed. Now you no.

 

 

 

Somewhere in my brain are layers of languages, that although still used in the world of the living,  are close to dead in my brain.

 

 

I lived in Israel for 6 months when I was 26 years old. Long enough ago to not remember the other languages I had by then, mostly forgotten.

I came home by way of Brussels. One night in that beautiful city.

In the morning, my friend and I had to get back to the airport. For that, we need to find a train.

 

 

We stopped a gendarme and I gave that most difficult question some thought. How to say it in French?  First to come was (transliteration) "eyfo ha rakeffet l"..... No. I realized,  that's Hebrew. Way too fresh in my head.  I need the French.

Although that should have been in the next, layer of language,  the Spanish came to mind. Living in New York and working in the school system, I heard a lot of Spanish.

:Donde esta la"....... No I thought. Wrong again.

Ah. Blanking again on the word where. Again, a Hebrew word comes, "le an" which is also not what I needed then or now. 

I had to look it up. I feel so dumb. I suppose that's better than old. I know I'm not really dumb.

"Ou et la tran por airport?" I said in my very best French accent.

The gendarme replied, " you walk down two streets and make a left".

I was stricken. As they say in Hebrew, "I had broken my teeth to find the words" and all for naught. He knew English.  Bastard. Could I have been that naïve to not realize he probably spoke English?  Short answer, yes.

 

I know many people since that time who have learned English as a Second, Third or Fourth language.

 

Still, unless they are gifted, I really pity them.

 

The "American Language" is considered to be very difficult to learn. I can see why. The few languages I have encountered appeared to have a certain order or logic to them. I love Spanish. There are only just so many ways to say the vowels and that's it. You write it as you hear it. Isn't that lovely?

I don't think I should speak about French. Except that when I took it at 18 I had a huge crush on the teacher, Mr. (I'll have to look up how to spell that in French, I'm so far off the dictionary on here is of no use)  Monsieur Montrose.

I probably would have cut class which I did eventually start to do as the language got harder on the tongue and the teachers got harder on the eyes and ears.  Looking back, not going was probably not the best choice of improving.

 

Even Hebrew, writing right to left, and with different alphabet, has a wonderful logic to it. Almost all words stem from a root word, usually it consists of three letters.  You add letters in the front and or end of the root and you can conjugate the past present or future. I'm not saying it's easy. And of course there is a lot more to it. Just sayin.

 

What these other languages seem to have is some sense of predictability.

 

Just like English/American. Right??

 

Hell no. Between the homonyms, synonyms and idioms alone, you could send a person to the insane asylum. If we still had them. In the 1970's they were not considered cost effective, and with the new medications, they were all closed down i.e.  they let all those people out of the  safe, funny farm.  *(AD)  That was a great idea. Let the mentally ill be in charge of taking their own medication and themselves.  

That was probably the beginning of the largest resurgence of homelessness since the depression had ended.

 

Man. Can I get off track or what? I had planned to write, a bunch of sentences as you saw in the title, and I've yet to get there.

But I will. And soon.

 

 

 

And, sew, how do yew learn to reed English?  Or too speak it?  Isle have to think.  Does won tuff it out aloan, or does one take sum lessens with a teem?

Their are whey's two fined out.

Ware should you go?

If I only gnu, I mite tele yew.

 

Allrite, I'm tyred of this. Wen you urn you're degree, shoot me a facts and I'll ask witch cellar you got this diploma frum and what grayed you finished.

 

When I taught University, my students did not know the differences in weigh two many words. I did try to teach them. I even tried memory tricks.

To no avail. And now, with texting and emojis one may no longer need to no how to spell or wright.

 

Y this bothers me, I do no know. But it does. Which is funny, because I have so much trouble with spelling. You would think it would bring me relief, but to me, it's just a little bit of my history that's dying. And that's a big deal.

 

 

 

 

Hee got da hole whorl in his hans.

I jess hope he don't drop it.