Russian Lesson in the Pool

 Floating, dawdling, Russian immigrants are a regular contingent at morning swim times in our senior community.  Some speak English, but as a group they naturally revert to their first language.

One recent morning a swimmer smiled at one of the Russians and asked, "How do you say hello in Russian?" The other woman grinned and slowly said the word. The native English speaker tried it out. The Russian woman repeated, and the first woman tried it again. Apparently, from head shake by the Russian, she got close. 

The friendly woman repeated it once more, thanked the Russian speaker, and said "My grandfather came to the United States as a three year old from Russia. But he didn't remember Russian. His family were Germans working in Russia, and they left when conditions became difficult."

A second Russian woman observed the interchange, and her friend turned and translated. She beamed too.

A fourth swimmer said she'd taken Russian in high school, but didn't remember it. And I chimed in that we only remember a language if we have to use it, preferably with a native speaker, not the disembodied voice in the language lab.

Did you have lab time as part of the required foreign language requirement in secondary school or college? I hated it. The large head phones clamped too tightly and messed up my hair. I felt stupid talking to a machine, and I didn't know if I pronounced words correctly or not. 

Then one summer we hosted a foreign exchange student for a week-end. His English was better than my Spanish, but we spoke mostly Spanish. It was the first glimmer of hope I had that I could learn enough to speak with someone. 

Teaching Spanish speakers and communicating with parents, then attending a (sort-of) bilingual church kept my Spanish skills alive. A few years ago I was riding the subway in Barcelona. I got on, and a young man offered me his seat, using English. In Spanish I answered, "Thank you, but I don't want people to think I'm old." A couple about my age, sitting nearby, laughed with me. I'd been slightly funny in a foreign language. It felt great.

In all these situations, a small effort to connect with someone in their own language caused a stranger to not feel strange. Somehow, the act of humbling oneself to be bad at the language, turned an outsider into an insider. What a marvel. 

However, this strategy did not work when I learned a few phrases of Finnish off of a website. I used them at a wedding with the groom's family. They looked perlexed until one of the party unmangled my greeting, and burst into laughter, turning to fill in the rest of them. Ah well, I tried. 

Have you had a chance to "cross the aisle" linguistically, and make a stranger feel welcome?

Announcer or Friend: What’s your role on Facebook?

I don’t know which has done more damage over the last few months--social distancing or Facebook. The combination of the two have weakened my personal relationships.

I found I spend more time on Facebook, which has soured me on the medium considerably. 

Allowing for the fact that FB is basically a system to share personal announcements or push an agenda, the recent monotony of “share this” has worn me down. Folks are yelling through megaphones to let me know they're "woke."

Pixabay

Those posts don't feel like overtures of friendship. They don't sound like invitations to a conversation. Indeed they're no more personal than a wave from a nodding acquaintance. The writers have become epassers-by, part of the parade driving through my livingroom with signs hanging out the window.

I realize too often I am just as annoying. My posts are all about me. I want your attention, your affirmation, your agreement. I want you to listen, AND to care.

I congratulate myself that at least I'm not seeking "followers," one step down in the degeneration of electronic relationships. (Did you know followers can be purchased? But some sites sell fake followers, so beware.) It's not new. Remember the girls who passed around their high school yearbooks to get the most “Be good” notes, assuring themselves of their popularity?   

 If Facebook has made me only an attention-seeker, I AM a low quality friend. 

If I sound like a megaphone and I leave emojis instead of a personal note on one of your posts, I apologize.  

Heaven forbid that I mistake it for friendship.  Be a friend and call me on it.

Are Your Friendships Fading or Flourishing?

Celebrating Valentine's Day on Sunday I dined with my husband and sent $5.00 bills origamied into hearts to the grandkids. 

Now I wish I'd celebrated my close friendships, too. 

During my school age years, our family made four state to state moves. My elementary school friends are dim memories. Those from high school are only photos in the yearbook. And I only have email addresses for two college buddies. 

Once I married and settled in one place I tried to hang onto every friendship like a leech. Undoubtedly I misread clues and tried to stay tethered past the time I should have cut the line.  Oh, I must have been so annoying.  

Eventually I understood that friendships fade and I've learned to read the signals. When a gal pal can't find time for even an occasional social event, I think twice before making contact again.  I only keep people on my Christmas card list for a couple of years before I eliminate the ones who don't reciprocate. When my maybe-friend only sends forwarded emails, I figure I'm not worth her time. 

Electronics have not helped foster healthy friendships. Facebook helps me know where you are and what you're doing, but doesn't really invite me in. Twitter's like eating one bite of pie and calling it dessert.  I feel like a piece of furniture when I'm talking to someone who answers their phone and drops me like a hot potato.

My time for making and fostering rich friendships is much shorter than it was twenty years ago. Maybe that's why I am so reluctant to admit kinship has withered on the vine.

So I'm that much more thankful for good friendships. They flourish because we're mutually mindful. I only miss my monthly dinner out with the book club if I'm infectious or feverish. We have a standing date for Wednesday lunch. And occasionally I even drop in on one.

I don't hear from far flung soul sisters frequently, but I know if Judy from Oregon comes within a hundred miles, she'll try to to rendezvous. And we'll pick up where we left off two years ago. 

You can't make or keep a friend without investing time, and both blessings are more and more precious as each day goes by.  

Claiming a Name

Our book club celebrated our 15th anniversary last week, cake, candles and all. We sang "happy birthday to us...happy birthday dear Lattes, happy birthday to us.”  

We are the Read-a-Lattes, (and the Go-a-Lattes, and the Laugh-a-Lattes...)

Like families, sports teams, and other social organizations, we wanted a name. We started with the Bookworms, shortened to the Wormies. But it lacked sophistication, flair—and we groused every time we said it. 

Riding around Sunset Beach I noticed the houses have names, too. Most of them play on words. This large yellow house is probably owned by boomers who couldn't resist naming it the Yellow Submarine. Or, it was somebody's favorite song and so they painted the house to match.

Sometimes the owners incorporate the family name and heritage: Scotts' Lowland Fling.

Latitude Adjustment certainly describes what time at a beach can do for you.  

The most evocative house name was Minutes to Memories. The namers imagined time spent with family and friends which built traditions and made memories that would bind together.

One group of young women temporarily named their second story condo with a banner hung over the rail. UD...University of...Dubuque? Delaware? Dayton?

It identified them as part of a distinctive group, set apart from the rest of us. They belong, and they're special. 

Doesn't that speak to our most basic human needs, to be part of a group who values and affirms you?  

That's why you can identify motorcyle clubs, like the Black Tigers MC, roaring down the highway. They travel together and are branded by their jackets. 

We don’t wear leather, just once-a-year matching T-shirts. Our brand is our name. We belong, and we’re special.

What name do you claim? 

Second Wind

I’m not an athlete, but even I know that if I rest before I get too tired, I get a second wind. 

This is just as true when exercising emotions.  

missed our turn-off, but got close to the Arch!

Recently, my husband and I drove to Missouri upon my father's death. I expected to feel distress, sadness, and anxiety. But apparently I have shallow emotional reserves and time with family quickly drained me. Once spent, I fled to the hotel. 

As a highly introverted person, I best refill when I have time alone. That wasn’t an option yet. 

I persevered through the short trip, ready and relieved to depart. 

Once home I felt like an old helium balloon hovering just above the floor. Over the next days I promised myself no agenda but to nap. We expected out-of-town guests in three days; but, I reckoned, I’d be at least partially reinflated by then. 

However, I’d written down the wrong dates, and the day after our return my friends called and said they were two hours away. Should they stop for dinner first?

I was dismayed, and dreaded what I had formerly anticipated.  My husband reassured me and said a quick prayer while we made up the guest bed. 

Our friends were gracious, insightful, and let us set the pace--old-people slow-motion.

Thank you, Scott and Becki. (Bec on the left, Scott's the photographer) 

By the time we retired the first evening my consternation had faded.   Although still weary, I knew they understood my poverty of spirit. 

Over the next days they shared their emotional energy, and I got a second wind. 

It blew in with their arrival, buoyed me up for the duration of their stay, and I rode it out on the jetstream of their departure.

Anne Lamott says it better than I can:

“This is the most profound spiritual truth I know: that even when we're most sure that love can't conquer all, it seems to anyway. It goes down into the rat hole with us, in the guise of our friends, and there it swells and comforts. It gives us second winds, third winds, hundredth winds.”

Beach song

Six women friends and I chatter while we unload the cars for our annual beach week. Each interaction between us spins another silken thread into the web of our relationship.

This week creates thousands of new connections and each one will change me minutely. We delve a level deeper into each others' histories and find similarities, or not. Either way, more intimate knowledge of another's life helps me encourage her more aptly. 

We feast, and ever afterwards the smell of mango and crunch of jicama will remind me of the friend who prepared the delicious slaw. 

The bike racehome to beat a storm proves to us that we're stronger and faster than we thought. We laugh and dash up the house stairs as the rain pelts down.

I practice patience with my friend's precise way of doing things, and she surely has to do the same with my lackadaisical attitude. 

The web we create is also a safety net. One of our group is at home waiting for a pathology report. We join hands to pray. 

Our togetherness creates 720 possible conversation combinations. It's like an old telephone switchboard with an operator plugging and unplugging us into the partly line. As an introvert I am sometimes overwhelmed and have to unplug my line and find a quiet place alone. 

Then I return refreshed and ready to sing again from the synapse.