On New Tricks and Old Dogs

If there are old dogs that still can learn new tricks, I'm certainly one.

True, my fluency at German, at typing, and at sheet music reading and at God knows what else don’t seem to be improving at all these days, but I just refuse to lay the blame for that on the fact that I'm already in my 50's.

I'm not a lazybones either - a conclusion too many people who know me seem to be so ready to jump at.

Those who don’t have the slightest idea of how much effort it takes to master … no matter what (especially when there is no money and no one around to help) will in all likelihood look down on your initial efforts, shrug at your progress and frown at your laboriously worked end results. It’s no use to try to explain a thing to them. No matter what you say or do – which will never be understood at all – you can only be doing the wrong thing, the wrong way, at the wrong time and for the wrong reason.

In the capacity of my own personal trainer for a lifetime, however, I know that I still can learn new things and exactly how fast, and I also know exactly what I want to learn and what for.

I got used to assessing on my own all the resources at hand, the skills and limitations I have, at what clip I can get ahead, in a nutshell, everything. And I find myself now as determined to learn as I've always been and always will. Drawbacks do exist. Stagnant phases too. It's simply natural.

The experience I enjoy now with French came as a windfall. I've been speaking French almost on a daily basis recently, which never happened to me before. I’m delighted. It’s always been no travels, no French speakers, nothing at all but my readings. No wonder my spoken French is still a little stiff, no wonder I still produce stilted utterances and make unreasonable mistakes. Lack of practice, that's all. Readings alone can – and do – work wonders to someone's knowledge of a foreign language, but nothing can replace practice. Now I’m finally practicing. Something I find nothing short of serendipitous.

However, I’m no longer blogging much. My typing is still too sorry. My music is not being sufficiently practiced and I'm not making enough money yet, either. There isn’t really much to be preened on. I’m just musing.