A few years ago I sat in my tiny Waco, Texas apartment watching coverage of the Iron Man triathlon in Hawaii. I was a couple of months into the clinical psychology program of Baylor University (that school being the lead weight at the center of the rubber sheet that is Waco – half the town orbits around it) and trying to get used to being back in school after three years in the Real World. I was pretty excited about the Baylor program but also apprehensive. I was thinking that, if things were going to get as tough as the 2nd and 3rd years said they were, I needed something in my life besides school to keep me sane.
This isn’t heading where you think. It’ll be a cold day in… well, it’s unlikely that I’ll ever be much of an athlete – tri-, bi-, hept-, dec- whatever. But as I lounged on my Ikea couch and snacked on something unhealthy I was inspired by the way the Iron Man participants dedicated themselves to this one big goal and by the inspiration many of them seemed to draw from it. I wanted a goal like that; something just for me; something fun but challenging; something big enough to be hard but manageable enough that I wouldn’t just give up. And grad school didn’t count. There was only ever one thing that seemed like a real contender. I thought of something that had been an almost-goal of mine for a few years already. I decided I would finally learn Spanish.
It strikes me as funny that we speak so many different languages in this world. You would think that, from an evolutionary perspective, more of them would have died out. I mean, do we really need Portuguese? The Americans I know who’ve studied it say it’s a mix of French and Spanish. But the French think it’s more of a mix of Spanish and English. I can only assume that the Spanish think that it’s a mix of English and French, unless they just want to be contrary. Anyway, other than scholars studying writings in their original languages in order to get some nuance that is untranslatable, what is the point of having all these languages?
Let alone studying them. This from a former French major. Who used to bring home language-study tapes from the library to listen to when going to bed. Who’s tried to learn at least a handful of words in the mother tongue of every foreigner she’s ever met. Who is writing a blog about learning Spanish. There may not be an evolutionary need for all these languages, but that doesn’t keep me from wanting to know them all. They’re like Lays potato chips: you can’t have just one.
Well, my Spanish Iron Man didn’t get off the ground very far. I signed up to audit an intermediate Spanish class that fall (having already taken an intensive beginner class in college a few years before, and acquitting myself quite well thankyouverymuch) and promptly dropped it when the predicted grad school insanity picked up. I kept the text book and looked at it every once in a while just to make sure that, Yes, la casa still had quatro habitaciones on page 10. And I found little opportunities to speak Spanish here and there (“Si, I would indeed like more salsa, thank you.”) and to add a few words to my vocabulary. (“’Dar un silbido’ means ‘to whistle’? Really? How lovely. Thank you Veggie Tales!”) But they didn’t add up to much. Basically, I forgot about my goal or at least set it aside for another time.
That time came a few weeks ago around the time that I decided not to finish grad school. Something about my deteriorating physical and mental health – not to mention hygiene – suggested grad school was no longer the path for me. And no sooner did I start to seriously contemplate leaving this crucible but my Iron Man plan came back to mind.
More next time.
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