Je suis une femme

As you do on a typically standard Sunday evening, I have decided to brush up on my French. I will forever be indebted to my high school for instilling my love of Spanish into me, but, unfortunately, the same cannot be said for French. Our class went through various teachers in mere months, which made any type of continuity extremely difficult. One teacher in particular divided us into "the good side" and "the bad side", according to behaviour, which was just screaming out for trouble. The "bad side" started living up to their name and before you knew it, the whole class had been sent out to wait on the corridor as punishment. I also distinctly remember studying "le petit déjeuner" for an entire term, before finally moving onto "mon glace", which is wonderfully useful for if I ever find myself stranded in Paris at breakfast time or perhaps mid-afternoon in spring/summer to enjoy a refreshing ice-cream, but pretty much useless for anything and everything else. Looking back, I probably should have done a joint degree at university and taken the opportunity to learn another language then. However, at the time my feeling was that it was better to be a master of one trade, rather than a jack of several and my negative experience of French was enough to put me off for life, or so I thought.

So, I say "brush up" but what I really mean is start from scratch. I have downloaded a free app onto my mobile and am learning such tidbits as "Je mange" (I am eating) and "Il a un enfant" (He has a child). You have to start somewhere, and as I always say to my students, start with the basics. If you know how to say "he has a child", but it isn't true, he actually has two rabbits and a parakeet, yet you don't have the vocabulary for this, then you should say "he has a child" and perfect the structure until you can substitute one thing for another. Don't try to be too ambitious at the very beginning.

This is something that I have realised for myself this week - sometimes we forget to take our own advice. I am being impatient on the job front. I am spending every waking minute that I have, (when not at work, obviously) focussing on applications and what I can do to improve my profile whilst constantly searching for entry-level positions. Being proactive is obviously a positive thing, but I think it can be taken too far. At the moment I am restricted geographically as to what I can do and it is making me anxious. I am in Spain until at least the end of June, but most likely until the end of July, and I feel that the job-hunt will be infinitely easier when I am based in the UK. (Being able to phone, or go door-to-door if needs be is invaluable... there's a lot to be said for face-to-face contact).

So, I have decided (mainly for my sanity) to take things with a bit more calm and patience for now. Obviously I won't give up on my media dream and I will keep my eye out for opportunities and keep applying, but, until I am in a better position to be proactive, I am going to keep myself busy with running, French and this blog of course! (Passport story coming soon...) It's all too easy to want everything now, (especially me, my mum once compared me to a rottweiler, saying that when I have an idea I will just not let it go) but patience is a virtue. I just have to trust that it will happen... soon, but not now.