Today I find fascination with Language

By no means do I study etymology. But I find it amusing how folks choose to use language to express themselves.

I have the snobbish opinion that folks who use “dope” as an adjective tend to fail to recognize themselves as appearing like one.That’s like using “too” or “wow, like” or “rilly”. Not that I don’t sound like a ditz when I’m speaking to folks or hem and haw and um, and giggle and say whatevs or slang with regular frequency, but the older I get the more I recognize how language is much more than just words. It is inflection, posture, tone, volume, and accent. It is timing. It is the lilt in speech that determines sarcasm or earnest expression. It is a sensitivity to language, both in terms of low context (just the words and what they mean) vs high context (taking into account body language, eye contact, and empathetic guages of the situation) that determines the connection between people or the painful disconnect between others.

My father and I don’t speak in the same language. And I don’t just mean that literally as in he speaks Korean and I speak English because we both know that I suck at foreign language comprehension and facility so we speak in English at the most basic level with each other. I find the tone of my voice being more expressive, open, and warm with him. I mimic and echo his pidgin accent and speech. It’s not intentional and not meant to be interpreted as condescension. I have just learned to modulate the frequency, speed, and style of my communication with my father so that he doesn’t feel the need to struggle to express himself with me. Our conversations are not sophisticated. They revolve around the weather, health, work, and how come I still don’t have a proper boyfriend. However language, if anything, at the most literal level, though clumsy and unsophisticated, never fails to relay the intentions and affections between us.

My brother and I don’t quite speak in the same language either. Perfect English. He takes the tone of authority and knowledge. He knows that the inflection of nagging will turn me off. I reflect a tone of either resignation, indifference, or supplication to make the conversations as painless as possible. I love my brother, I really do. But we will probably never be able to connect at a visceral level, even with our perfect capacity for contemporary diction, business terminology, and expansive vocabularies.

An elderly yet sprightly nun in France could speak German, a dialect used by north African sheep farmers, French and Arabic. She could speak pidgin English. Last year in September, she and the other nun would stand behind their chairs before every meal, bow their heads gently, close their eyes, clasp their rough hands with each other, and sing grace. In Latin. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever experienced and no words in my vocabulary, no tools in my writing skills, no expression, absolutely nothing that I own or have power over, could ever express with complete glory the gorgeous experience of those moments or how much I envied the purity of their love and thanks for the almighty. The voices of Angels, even that phrase sounds so trite. It was completely breathtaking.

And language, I find fault with. Because so often I fail to express with precision and accuracy the tumbleweeds rolling about in this poor little head.