It is a small thing, to learn a language. Hard for some, easier for some. Importantly small and hugely important. The words that roll off our tongues are the same but mostly with a different meaning. To learn the language of the same, is not a small thing.
When you give me a sentence I am supposed to take it in, for its exact value, no more, no less. I am supposed to know the exact weight of your words and put that exact weight on my brain to weigh my words that will come out as a response. Do we still do this? And when did we forget?
I want to greet your mother in her language. Not your father. Your mother.
Woman to woman with an age gap produce different conversations. Warmer or colder, depending. More engaging even if they are superficial. Words are used in milligrams. Every word is weighed. Some lightly said – become way too heavy.
I never greeted your mother. I never had a chance to meet her. She left you to this world and to me. There is no regret and no joy. You came to me without your North Star. And now I am that.
That a woman must be the thread that holds it all together, by design of nicety or of force. That our hands must do more than hands do. Must tell words in languages forgotten and unspoken. This is why the language of the freshly baked bread speaks more than a handful of useless words in 12 Times New Roman.
Say little, love much.
