Translate

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Memories of Times Past


It was my own fault. I should have changed the contact lens when I felt a slight discomfort. But I merely adopted the hardened contact lens wearers’ motto of ‘Blink and Bear It’ and went downstairs. And it was late. And what are tears for if not to wash out pesky dust specs from contact lenses?

Driving to work got a little more painful and so the tried and tested procedure of squeezing the lid of the offending eye, raising the contact lens from the surface of the eye and thus allowing any mote to slip away courtesy of the tear ducts doing their job was applied.

And the contact lens slipped to the side.

This is not a tragedy – even when driving half blind in early morning traffic on a busy Barcelona motorway. It is, however a serious inconvenience. I was effectively half blind with dawn still a way away and cars weaving around as if they were taking part in some sort of transport version of a festive maypole dance!

There was no real opportunity to stop so I tried a past technique from my hard contact lens days and looked in the direction of where I thought the lens was. This sometimes has the effect of easing the lens back onto the centre of the eye. Not in this case!

My squinting attempts to regain sight resulted in the lens getting more scrunched up so I had to remove it. Every contact lens wearer has been told not to do what every contact lens wearer does in these circumstances: we pop the lens into the mouth.

For the rest of the journey I had to concentrate on not swallowing the lens as I had active hopes that I would be able to reinsert it when I was finally able to stop.

Reinsertion was not a success and I thanked whatever gods there were that I had remembered to put a spare pair of glasses in the car in case of just such an emergency.

So, for one day only, I hope, I am back to glasses and the response of the kids is as if I have come to school wearing a revolving, flashing bow tie. Presumably their reactions will be just as marked when I come in tomorrow wearing contact lenses again!

I am sitting by an open window in the ‘library’ as I have to do a break time duty supervising kids who want to work and the heat of the sun is (almost) forcing me to move away. Even for Spain the temperatures we have been getting in what ought to be the autumn are not normal. Insects are still flying and biting and grass is still growing. Colleagues are complaining that they are having to mow the lawn again when it should be quiescent for the autumn sleep! Apart from the fact that I am in school and not lying on the balcony of the third floor in my house, I, of course, am loving it.

I see from the news that there is a respectable amount of water falling in the places where you would expect it to be deposited: the north west of Spain and the Pyrenees so I feel perfectly justified in wallowing in the heat and the steady stream of sunshine that graces this land!

The idea of visiting the UK this Christmas is growing on me and I think that the price will not be too expensive. I am able to travel outside normal tourist times, especially in January when my holiday is somewhat longer than the British equivalent. I must do my sums!

I am attempting to get Spanish lessons. Irene has suggested someone and they are attempting to get in touch with me. In the usual way living as we are in a period when personal communication has never been easier, we are not coinciding and a series of missed calls indicates effort if not success!

One of my colleagues is sitting opposite me as I type and attempting to do her English homework translating a passage about cast off clothes of the famous. From time to time she is asking me to translate into Spanish various words which I am having to render in my usual circumlocution as phrases and dumb show! This if nothing else indicates how much I need to take further Spanish lessons! With any luck I will have made contact with the teacher today and my twice weekly lessons can commence.

There is no justification for my having put off the lessons since I came to work in this school as the school itself will pay something towards the cost. I have to admit that it is sheer laziness and the real fear of all the hard work that is involved in trying to get new words to stick in my brain – and then the even harder work to retrieve them when needed!

My attending Spanish lessons is made all the harder by people who actually speak Spanish telling me that my Spanish is quite good. The evidence for this judgement and assessment is, to say the least, flimsy. My Spanish is ignorance fuelled by hysteria and conversations result in exhaustion of all parties involved. I will know that I have achieved some degree of fluency when I have a conversation in Spanish and there is nothing remarkable about it whatsoever and both parties walk away from the dialogue as refreshed as when they started it!

Fond hope!

No comments: