Moving on

Lughnasa                                                                           College Moon

It’s been another full tilt day. Business meeting in the morning, then shed cleaning. We worked, ate lunch, napped, and worked some more. Geez. I told Kate after this experience that I believe we should do the same in our new place. Every 20 years just like here.

We’re over half done with packing and decluttering, the momentum seems to be shifting now.  More like we’re moving toward Colorado than away from Minnesota.

In my Latin yesterday with Greg we decided I would keep on with every two week sessions, reading Caesar and Ovid and whoever else, I think Vergil’s Georgics, too. Apparently at my particular place in the learning curve reading and more reading, grappling with each nuance is the way forward. After the amount of time I’ve invested so far, I’ve decided to go all the way. I want to become a fluent reader of Latin. That’s a ways away, but no longer imaginary.

It’s odd, I realized, but every two weeks for one hour is 26 contact hours in a year. A language class for a 12 week quarter would meet at least 3 times, usually 5 with a lab, which is either 36 or 60 hours a quarter. We’re not even doing a full 26 because we have sessions that we miss or extend for three weeks. That means I’m advancing ok given the number of contact hours of teaching.

Plus, while it’s certainly luxurious to have a personal teacher, a tutor, there is additional learning from being with a group doing the same exercises-a class. All this is self-talk, really, about taking 4 years plus to get to this level. Seems like a long time to me. But maybe not.