Now that I’ve had a few weeks of lessons I thought it might be an idea to say a few words on the experience. It’s not the first time I’ve returned to study but it’s the first time I’ve had a specific goal in mind. I’m feeling incredibly positive about it all, despite possibly being older than everyone in both classes, older than one of my teachers and possibly older than the other. I don’t know if this age difference is apparent to anyone else but it became apparent to me yesterday.
A part of learning English Language is doing a quick refresher on English grammar. We went through yesterday at speed and the comment my teacher made twice was to recall your primary school English lessons. I’m so glad I wasn’t drinking at the time as that would have made me choke, primary school was a long time ago, I actually said that on the second occasion and his reply was ‘not that long ago’, I declined to take up the gauntlet as I didn’t want to interrupt the class but I suspect I was in primary school before he was alive. Not that I feel any older than anyone else in my class but that’s not the point.
We then had an interesting aside in the lift going down to lunch. Yesterday I felt older than normal as I’d slept badly the previous night and I made a comment about feeling old today. One of my classmates tried to dismiss that by saying he was old, I made the mistake of asking how old was old and he said ‘almost 21’ in a slightly hesistant voice (I hope I wasn’t intimidating). I quashed that thought by telling the assembled populace of five that I had kids older than that, he recovered well by mentioning he felt he had an old soul and then was saved by the lift coming to the ground floor. Sometimes I should just shut up and let people feel their age.
Just as an aside. Typos can be interesting things. I’ve just corrected one I made in the previous paragraph. I was thinking ‘second’ and I thought that’s what I’d typed until I was reading back and realised ‘section’ made absolutely no sense.
I’m coping reasonably well with classes, despite not doing much of this for a few years (my last foray into study was 2011 and I only did one subject) I’m managing to stay awake during classes. I’ve got two classes and they’re virtually back-to-back with only a half hour break between them. I do find I’m struggling by the last half hour or so and that’s when the clock watching starts. I’m having less trouble than the last time I started English Language. This was the year before I was diagnosed with low iron and various other health challenges and my brain just wasn’t coping with the influx of new information, I keep most of these health challenges under control and am finding I’m rising more to mental challenges than I did back then.
Finding time for homework is challenging as I’m over-committed at present but I’m doing most of it. I handed in an analysis yesterday and expect to get it back covered in red pen. As my teacher said ‘the smart ones do lots of work early and learn from their mistakes’, I’m not saying I’m smart but the reason I’m doing these classes is because I need the feedback so I need to do the work in order to get the feedback.
Having taken Mondayitis completely out of the equation I’m finding I’m starting to get through my To Be Read Pile. I was taking time out from that in order to read a children’s book for Mondayitis and now I don’t have that interruption I’m going much more steadily through my Reading Pile. It’s something I’ll still never finish but I have a much greater chance of getting there.
Having rambled for far too many words I’m going to leave you until tomorrow when I reveal which male science fiction writer starts with N. Don’t ask till tomorrow as I have no ideas as yet.