“I know why you’re not learning Spanish as good as me, Grandma. It’s because you don’t say the words very good.”

This from someone who writes his “J’s” backwards, can’t button his own pajamas, and eats lunch out of a dinosaur lunch box.

I would have laughed if he didn’t have a point. His daily treks to a Spanish/English preschool has him putting Spanish words together into sentences while I still struggle with double syllables. Which means he carries on conversations and I mainly converse in short words and one word sentences.

“Sol?” I’ll ask as I hold up a plant I’m considering buying.

“Si.”

“Agua?”

“Poquito.”

 “Trenta?” Oops....that one’s for Starbucks.

And there I am, heading home with a plant that will never grow into the big pot I bought for it. 

So, yes, I even have some trouble with individual words. Between my bad accent, my little bit of French and my Starbucks Italian, I occasionally slip up. The big pot is only a small frustration though. The real problems come when I try to string words together. Because, all too often, Spanish speakers have no idea what I’m saying. 

I was at a mall recently and asked a clerk where the cinema was.

“Donde es el cine?” I said clear as day. Although I might have said “esta” and I might have said “la cinema.” And it’s possible I was a little bit tentative. What’s important is that the clerk had no idea what I was saying.

“Cine?” I tried again, reverting to my one word success and taking care to put the question mark at both the beginning and end of the word. She finally understand and had the good sense to point rather than give me verbal directions.

The frustrating thing for me is that I can usually say the Spanish words correctly and even string them together into sentences in my head. They just don’t come out the same when I say them aloud.

I read an article recently about how adults tackling a foreign language often do better when under the influence. It made sense to me, particularly when I realized they meant under the influence of alcohol and not under the influence of a three-year old, which hasn’t done me much good at all.

I was thinking about taking a trip to Tequila the other morning when my grandson taught me the Spanish word for ball.

“Pelota” I repeated.

“You said that real good, Grandma,” he told me. “You won’t have to come to my school to learn that one.” 

It felt like a graduation. Appropriately celebrated with a little tequila.