Handwriting my Spanish lessons has made me realize how much I miss writing by hand. I have rarely done so in well over two decades other than shopping lists and the occasional handwritten note in a birthday or thank you card.
Writing by hand slows me down, gives me permission to ponder and/or truly focus. I didn’t like being slowed down when I had produce on a deadline, but now that I don’t (as much), I greatly prefer moving at a slower pace. I feel like I’m living in the moment instead of trying to outrun it.
It’s a nice feeling!
Does this mean I’m going to revert to handwriting journals instead of typing blog posts? Probably not, although I could now that I have Genius Scan and can scan whatever I write and then publish that. But I’ll probably just limit my handwriting to taking down lessons, which I may commit to eternity via Genius Scan so I don’t have to lug around the actual hundreds of pages of notes I’m producing. Right now they’re in a three ring binder so I can keep them handy when all of my devices are turned off. They’re by my armchair so I can pick them up easily to review or add to them.
FLASH CARDS ARE TERRIFIC!
Yesterday I made a series of almost 100 flash cards to help me memorize common Spanish infinitives. I tested myself on them several times (I only put on cards the ones I didn’t know beforehand), and I knew just over half of them. That’s progress! I had to make small drawings in the corners of some of them to remind me what the answers were. For example, I drew a baby in diapers with an arrow pointing to the diaper for the infinitive “to change” and a drawing of Trump’s face and hair for the infinitive that means “to take advantage of.” I drew a finish line for the infinitive “to finish,” and a needle with thread to indicate the infinitive for “to sew.” I still sometimes have to refer to the drawn image on some of them.
SIMILARITIES AND PRONUNCIATION
A great many Spanish words are similar to English ones: actor, cable, etc. but they are pronounced differently.
I’m very familiar with Spanish pronunciation. Unlike English, it isn’t schizophrenic.
A is always pronounced like “ahhh” like the “o” in “often” and “omimous”
E is always pronounced like the “e” in “egg.”
I is always pronounced like the “i” in “Lisa”. (So, my first name is pronounced “Krees” (rhymes with “grease”) in Spanish
O is always pronounced like the “o” in “oatmeal.”
And “u” is always pronounced like the “oo” in “cool.”
My Spanish teacher in high school said I could read/pronounce Spanish like a native because I had the pronunciation so well memorized. But only rarely could I actually understand what I was reading! That is changing, the more I study, but I still get tripped up sometimes. I can misinterpret what is being said due to sentence structure. In Spanish, you can sometimes say essentially the same thing in two (or more) different ways. This is true in English, too, but the sentence structure in English is completely native to me, and in Spanish it isn’t (yet).
Example:
Mi nombre es Kris. (My name is Kris.)
Me llamo Kris. (Exact translation: I am called Kris.)
Infinitive: Llamar (to call)
There are additioal (more convoluted) examples on some of the handwritten pages I published here yesterday.
It’s a process!
