French Makes Me Nervous

Or at least it does sometimes. It is frustrating not being fluent in a language. I am proud of the French I know, as well as the bits of Italian and deeply buried Spanish, but that is not the same as fluency.

It's not like I haven't had plenty of practice this trip. So far I have managed to negotiate getting our money back from the mousey apartment's owner (as well as the agency that booked it). I rented a new apartment. I negotiated with a French Bank to withdraw the funds needed for said new apartment. I signed a contract with our non-English speaking landlord and even joked about mice. I braved a French post office and successfully mailed special envelopes. I managed to get us help at the Apple repair shop and bought a new keyboard when the top case on Cody's computer died. I bought us food, negotiated the fresh market, read signs and learned new words.

But I always had to think first. (Cody and Jayme say I squint and look off into the distance when accessing the French dictionary in my head.) Most words don't come to me naturally for most encounters. Hello, Goodbye and Have a nice day are easy. Arranging to meet the landlord to get our deposit back and hand back the keys is not. I write notes down, prompts for the conversation, ask him to speak more slowly please and we manage.

But I would so like to do more than manage. I hate not knowing the language. Not being able to understand the tinny voice on the metro loudspeaker that apologizes that the train is late because there has been a suicide on line 8. Not being able to always tell how much something costs without looking at the receipt. Not being able to get the joke or joke back. And not being able to talk beyond the level of a preschool student.

I have taken classes. I probably should take more. I am always far rustier at the beginning of our trips to Paris. By the end I am busting out the French I do know confidently. But a small part of me is still nervous that I will order the wrong food or book us on the wrong train. Or that I won't be able to figure out an alternate way to say something because I don't know the verb or noun.

I think we would need to move here for a year. Then maybe I could attain some level of fluency. We would need to bring the cats and the hens so they would learn French too. And then they could tell us how they prefer living in Oakland, where there is room to roam and the sun shines on the hardwood floors. And I would completely understand every word they said.