Gratitude 5

Another thing for which I am thankful is that I can speak another language other than my native English.  For years I wanted to do this.  Throughout my twenties and thirties I often wondered what it would be like to express myself fluently in French or German or Spanish with the same kind of ease I enjoy in my mother tongue.  I did want to be fluent in something.  German seemed like a natural choice, being my mother's first language, despite my opinion that it would make a great candidate as the official language of Hell.

French has always been, of course, the ultimate language of worldly sophistication, the language of love, as well as Canada's other official language.  So, I felt conflicted between the two, though I already had a little background in Spanish from three years of high school.  Speaking only my mother English left me feeling somewhat incomplete as a human being.  I felt embarrassed about it.

During my first visit to Costa Rica I suddenly realized I was going to have to learn Spanish.  I knew I would be returning there someday, perhaps to live or to work and that I must learn how to communicate with the local people.  Spanish, three years later, in 1997, began to turn into an obsession with me, when a complete stranger approached me and gave me a small Spanish-English dictionary.  This individual had no idea that I would be wanting to learn the language but that was okay.  God had already spoken.

After a couple of false starts, at the end of 1999 I began to learn Spanish seriously.  Doors began to open.  I met an old friend by chance in the Mount Pleasant branch public library who was learning Spanish and had a number of Spanish-speaking friends to whom she introduced me.  I learned about resources: radio programs in Spanish, cheap Spanish classes (one dollar a pop at Gordon Neighbourhood House) and where to find books, newspapers and magazines in Spanish.  I practiced and studied daily and began to learn intensively Spanish grammar while building my vocabulary.  I became utterly obsessed and consumed by the language and the culture.  Early on I was already acquiring a good accent and within two years had some conversational ability.  I had no idea if I would ever see Costa Rica or Mexico as I was still unemployed, had no money and my mental health was still very fragile.  Then, one thing after another happened.  I found an affordable apartment, a good psychiatrist, an excellent employment counsellor and in time...employment.  I continued to study Spanish zealously, always arranging my day to have some time to listen to some of el lenguaje de los angeles (the language of the angels) on the radio.  I was finding secondhand bookstores with generous stocks of Spanish literature.  I was meeting native speakers.  Suddenly, I had a passport and in 2008, with intermediate level Spanish, I returned to Costa Rica for one month, where I became a nearly advanced speaker.  In 2009 it was a month in Mexico City and more Spanish immersion followed by five weeks more in Costa Rica the following year and three days in Mexico City, then back to Mexico City and Chiapas for six weeks in 2012 for more Spanish immersion and then I was an advanced speaker.  I have since returned twice to Mexico City and Puebla and have been to Bogota, Colombia twice.

Since finally getting a laptop and home internet in 2011, the various available resources became an embarrassment of riches for me as I took advantage of Spanish meetup groups and the Conversation Exchange page to connect me to native Spanish speakers to exchange support in English for Spanish, and of course the multiplicity of documentaries in Spanish and other videos on YouTube.  Skype is also an incredibly rich resource for connecting face to face to people who live in Spanish-speaking countries and some new friendships have formed out of this effort.

My level of Spanish now is at full or nearly full fluency, I use it daily and have awesome Spanish speaking friends, especially a buddy from Peru I practice with regularly and I am preparing for another visit to Costa Rica next month.  I am also frequently able to offer support in Spanish to my mental health clients at work who come from Latin America and speak only limited English.

I have no idea what the future is going to bring but I am so grateful to God that he has opened this route to me to learn and master another language so beautiful as Spanish.  It has done wonders to my brain, my mind, my horizons, my worldview.  For me it is very much a language of the heart and I can express myself in some ways more freely and openly than in English.  I am incredibly enriched by the intimate knowledge I am gaining of the various Hispanic cultures as well as the awesome friends I am coming to know from those countries.

I also have the added advantage of strengthening my neuropathways and thus protecting my brain against the ravages of dementia for when I get older.  I think that a friend of mine said it eloquently when he told me that the reason I generally feel so good, happy and positive whenever I speak Spanish is that for me it is literally like a new beginning in my life and now I can express myself again with none of the past baggage that used to encumber me in my native English.  This seems also to be penetrating my experience in English as I begin a new stage of life, feeling suddenly very young and very new again.

This is something truly to be grateful for.