Being interested – in stuff

I don’t know why I’m studying French. I’ve only been to France twice in my life – well, to Paris. But they were mad-rush airport-and-hotel business-trips that could have been anywhere. It was hardly the Paris of Woody Allen’s “Midnight in Paris”. The Provence of Ridley Scott’s “A Good Year” would have been better. I could have settled then into a rural backwater, a crusty ex-pat-gone-native, pigged out on red-wine and cheese.

I’ve been learning French since I was eleven, dropped it at twelve, then picked it up again in my forties. But I always found it difficult to make more than stilted Pidgin conversation with it. Still, it would have been good to sit at a French pavement café and order, in French, without the waiter saying to me, in perfect English: “it would be much easier, mate, if we both spoke English.”

But with one thing and another I never did make it to France for pleasure. And then this Covid thing has put the Kybosh on it for goodness knows how long. So there’s no point labouring the language learning, is there? Except I’ve discovered this language App on my phone. It’s called Duolingo and I’m addicted to it – been brushing up my French like Billy-O.

I don’t know what use I’ll put it to. And I admit it does seem rather a small life’s ambition to order un croque-monsieur without le serveur smirking. Or is that “une croque-monsieur“? The gender thing throws me. I mean like how in France a glass is masculine, yet a cup – not that much different in functional terms – is feminine. To a native English speaker this seems an unnecessary complication. Or are we missing something? Do languages with gendered nouns reveal something philosophically profound about that nation’s culture? I don’t know. Maybe I’m thinking too much about things. But then I like doing that, so no harm.

I mean: Esque il y a un raison ces choses est intéressant de moi? Well is there? A reason these things are interesting to me?

So, there I am sitting at my table and the waiter comes over and I order my stuff in French. But I do it with a strong Lancashire accent that sometimes confuses even Englishmen. Could it be he’s thinking it would be cool to be English, as much as I’m thinking it would be cool to be French? Because, you know, that’s it with us humans. We’re always exploring the possibilities. Always une touche de glamour sur l’inconnu. A certain glamour about the unknown.

Except of course, in times of chaos, fear has us shutting out the unknown. This can be anything beyond our normal boundaries – boundaries of state, of trust, or even just our day to day experience. Thus, we can be abused in certain parts of England for speaking Arabic, or having a black skin, or for wearing a face-mask.

Depuis quand sommes-nous devenus si peur de tout? When did we become so afraid of everything?

I could read some French poets perhaps. But then I’m barely familiar with the full range of the British. So there’s no mileage in that, beyond the satisfaction of discovery of course. Or I could read Proust’s seven volume tome, A la recherche du temps perdu, in French? That might take some time, especially considering I got no further than the first chapter in English. Yes, we thrive on challenge, but we should also pick our battles.

I suppose that’s it though: challenge. Chaos is what we face on a daily basis. It is our lot in life, but there are times when chaos wins out. It becomes a fire-breathing dragon, devouring the foundational structure of our societies. It burns away the certainties, devours our courage, and we seal ourselves off from fresh experience. We lose our fight against the dragon, and become much less than we can be.

It’s a small thing then, persevering with a foreign language one is unlikely to use. It’s just one of the many things that pique my interest, but each of them wins back a little order from the chaos. It lays a foundation to my affairs. And in seeking to make sense of things, anything that piques our interest, we slay the dragon, restore balance to our bit of the world, perhaps even improve things a little. And if enough of us do that,… well,…

Je pense que ç’est la raison nous dois la faisons.

I think that’s why we’ve got to do it. Just be interested,… in stuff.

It beats the hell out of chanting slogans, and leaving abusive comments on social media anyway.