Annie’s funniest comment last night: “Mom, I love Latin, but it's the German that's so hard! What do I do if I don’t know the German or the Latin?”
Somehow I had never asked myself the question how Annie's Latin class would be taught. Unreflectively I imagined it being taught from English to Latin since, after all, that is how I studied it for so many years. After two weeks of her starting Latin, I had to stop to grasp it: Annie is learning Latin from a German teacher. Of course it's being taught from German to Latin.
This girl is a rockstar. Her high school courses are mostly taught in German: biology, chemistry, history, geography math--all the standard classes are taught in German. Two classes--Italian literature and P.E.--are taught in Italian, one is in French and one in English (English as a foreign language taught to Swiss-Italians). And now she is taking an optional course . . . Latin??
How is she doing it? Simply amazing. She pops out of bed in the morning, brushes her teeth, feeds the bunnies, spruces her curls, grabs her backpack and sprints to the car. Is she thinking about German or Latin or the periodic chart (in German) as we drive the Appia? No. She starts her story-telling about the girls in her class and how they are going to get piadini (sandwiches) after school, so she'll be home later than usual; and then what Lorenzo was wearing yesterday and why the girls were laughing and why there are too many guys named Lorenzo in Italy--three in her class alone; and how she had to do a group project and was unfortunately paired with Carlo, and she had to do it all and he didn't even pretend to do any of the work but got the same grade that she did (you're welcome, Carlo!); and how she is going to stage the next scene of the novel she is writing (about four kids in the 21st century who are demi-gods and have super powers) in Rome, and she will be sure to include that Roman transportation workers are on strike that day.
One day, Annie will grow up. She will leave home and shine her brighter-than-usual light in some other place. Some fortunate young people will get to do life with her--her dorm mates, her classmates, her fellow majors. One day she'll have a family, a career, lots of friends, and she'll write books and tell stories and delight everyone around her with her baking, painting, bright eyes and disarming laugh.
For now, this gorgeous, radiant girl is living life under my roof and I get to share an orbit with her. It won't last much longer. The hole left in my home and heart will be larger than my heart originally had been. And I will remind myself that Annie exceeded me as a person, even at the tender age of 14.
Stay gold, Annie!
