Communication

A few of my friends have asked me why I won't just go for a ride with Mr. Moped.

In theory, I suppose that would be fun. It would be just the thing to put in the next best seller turned blockbuster movie ala Eat Pray Love. What else is a female traveling alone supposed to do, but sidle up to any available man? Or unavailable ones, if your taste runs that way.

However. I have this huge issue: Communication, and being able to do it well, is fundamental to my comfortability level. In a foreign country, short of ordering coffee, and pointing to things on menus, I do not enter into situations if I can not make myself clearly understood, and I can not clearly understand.

Some seem to thrive on hand gestures; others seem to be ok with semaphoresque type endeavors. Occasionally I have seen conversations carried out in grunts.

I am not ok with any of that. My preferred mode of communication is either the written or spoken word in my mother tongue (although I have weakness for the written). I do not willingly enter into extended situations where neither will be of use to me.

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An extension of this insistence on good verbal and written communication, now that I am reflecting on it, is kind of funny. Or weird.

I have rebuffed two maybe, three - oh dear, maybe four - guys simply because I realized that:

a) they couldn't speak properly

or

b) they couldn't write properly

There is nothing, in my world, more distressing than receiving a heartfelt declaration from the depths of a male soul, only to be going:

1) Ohmygosh he doesn't know the difference between "there and their."

2) Oh HELL no. He just said "you and me."

3) That is an interesting and entirely inappropriate use of semicolon.

4) That is not even a sentence. That is a dependent clause.

5) Did he really just say "Where are you at?"

6) Look at that. The then/than dilemma.

I could go on. And on.

Is this snobby?

Perhaps.

But then, maybe not. Where one of my friends might judge a guy she meets on his six pack, or lack thereof, I generally judge someone on their proficiency with language.

Cases in point:

1) I am head over heels in love with a blogger, simply because he writes like a demi-god. He is 18. This means that he is not only six years younger than yours truly, but also that he breaks my "he must be at least five years older than I am" rule. I am willing to throw age difference and rules to the wind. I am even willing to tear him away from his girlfriend. I am positive she is not good enough.

2) When Peter Kreeft came to a Theology on Tap when I was at school, I sat in the audience, impressed with his ideas, yes, but entranced with the way in which he worded them. I leaned over and told my friend that I wanted to marry him. She informed me that he happened to be married, and definitely over 70. I told her that I didn't care.

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There you have it. If you want to get on my good side, just use the English language properly. I am not asking for a Shakespeare sonnet here, but I am asking for something more than this train wreck:

"If I would have known that you wanted to go I would of brought you their, but I never would of thought about it; if you hadnt said nothing."

Let's play "spot the mistakes."