I have a weird relationship with English. I have no personal memory of my usage of the language in my early days. My sister tells me that a few of my relatives made me talk in English and laughed at my usage. Fortunately, I don't remember such incidents and feel no animosity to them (due to these incidents at least). The other memory of my usage of this language exists due to my attempt at story writing at the unripened age of eight. Many years later, I read these lines with embarrassment. I remember being inspired by my readings of Champak and wrote about two boys entering a haunted house whispering something to each other. Of course, I did not know the word whisper at that point and wrote "A said to B slowly..."
I remember almost nothing of the English I learnt in my school and college days. I remember the story "The Malefactor" through which I understood metaphor. I got to know the existence of the word malefactor too (which does not mean male-factor though some women might believe they mean the same). The other memory stays close to my heart - the poem "confessions of a born spectator" by Ogden Nash. I was shocked to see the American poet describing me; a born spectator too lazy to even cheer the players. Other than these and a few terms like noun and verb, everything else is hidden in the mist of disinterest.
In my 20's, I fell in love with P G Wodehouse's writings. His humour and his use of language had and still has a huge impact on me. He has an irreverent attitude towards english and twists it the way he wants to. It's difficult not to laugh and love words such as
"What ho!" I said.
"What ho!" said Motty.
"What ho! What ho!"
"What ho! What ho! What ho!"
After that it seemed rather difficult to go on with the conversation.
Wodehouse paved the way for humour in my writings. He inspired me to break the few rules I knew in English. Since these writings were in the form of letters to my parents, I had an adoring audience.
At some point in my career, I moved into managerial roles and all my work focused on talking to people, creating presentations, excel sheets and documents. I was not bad at these activities but I was not very good either. I was in the 80 percent category and in a world made up of 40 percents acting 100 percent, 80 percent is excellent. Soon I became the "go to" person to create documents and presentations.
Thus the building of my tower of Babel began. My insecurities of the past ensured that I focused on the mastering English without focusing on its rules. I wrote from my heart, I feel and if it sounded right, I thought it was right. People around did not correct me but wah-wahed me ahead (Oh! BTW, that wah-wahed is my tribute to PGW). The tower went higher and I started writing a blog. Almost no one knew its existence but I loved what I wrote and the tower grew further. The tower reached its pinnacle when I started writing poems. I felt I had come a long way and declared myself the emperor of the English land and my palace, the tower of ego that I had built over two decades.
And then I messed it all up. I decided to teach at a school. I ended up teaching in a school where every teacher is an expert in one or two subjects and English. Worse, the children themselves thought like literature graduates. I felt like the characters in that movie who ended up "paaden" instead of "pardon". Though there were minor mmmm-hmmmms and aah-haaaas initially, matters became grave when a young colleague trained her guns at me. One day I blurted out a unpolite instead of impolite and since then she hawks almost everything I say and write. I am reminded of the song "Every breathe you take" by The Police.
Every where you go
Every word you say
Every line you write
Every thought you think
I'll be correcting you
Oh! What a humiliating fall. To be treated thus by a person whose conversations largely consisted of "goo goo ga ga" while I was watching Chris Cornell sing "Black Hole Sun" ominously on MTV, is painful.
But like all clouds this one has a silver lining. I only have to find it to turn this fall into a rise. The evil ones of the 90s will never win over the 70s. We have The Beatles but you have to make do with the Backstreet boys. Ha! Take that.
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