In my most recent Italian class, we’re learning to use the indicative imperfect verb form. The teacher gave us sheets of paper asking us what we wanted to do when we were children, what we did at our house, what fears we had, what we did at school, what we weren’t allowed to do and what we wanted to be when we grew up. Then each of us shared our answers with the teacher and the other students. It made for some very funny conversations actually. The woman next to me said that she wanted to be a lawyer when she grew up. The teacher was incredulous “When you were little?! Most little girls wanted to be a ballerina or a movie star or something similar!” The woman’s excuse was “I was raised in a Jewish household. We were very serious!” The teacher liked my answer, though. When I was young, I wanted to be a princess with a very handsome prince, but… I also wanted to be a boy! Truthfully, I was a tomboy as a kid. In Italian, they call it “un maschiaccio,” I believe. Although at times I liked to dress up in my princess dress with a crown and little heels, most of the time I wanted to be a boy so that I didn’t have to wear dresses and could get muddy and dirty like my three brothers!
That class reminded me of my ex-husband, Laurent. He was French, but from the South of France – not from Paris. In fact, when we were at a store in Paris, one of the salesman asked me “Is that your husband?” “Yes. Why?” “His accent is horrible!” “That’s because he’s from the South!”
At the time of our meeting, Laurent had only been in the United States for about 7 months. Although he’d taken English in school, it’s never quite the same as speaking with natives. He often struggled with certain words. For instance, he always said “virgin” when he meant “version.” He also said “jet flag” rather than “jet lag.” Once when he stubbed his toe, he looked at me and started to say “I hurt my…” He didn’t know the word, however. I kept asking him what he thought the word was. He finally said doubtfully “Foot finger?” My two roommates and I never cut him a break as far as learning English. We teased him day and night whenever he mispronounced something or didn’t know the correct word. I know from my own brushes with other languages that that actually helps me NOT to repeat my mistakes! When we had our first major fight, I was so angry that I wrote him a five page letter. He confessed to me many months later that it took him FOREVER to read. He had to consult his French-English dictionary a million times. When he finally understood everything that the letter said, he was really upset and burned it! All’s well that ends well, though; we still got back together. My proudest moment was when his mother came to visit and said to me “Laurent speaks English so well now.” If only she knew the hell we put him through to get him to that point! Then again, she also complimented me on my French accent. I wasn’t sure whether that was a good thing or not. If I speak with more of a Southern French accent, then Parisians will think I have a horrible accent, too!