measurements for week #6, and schizophrenia

Alex and me during a rainy day self-portrait, taken June 8, 2006

For the third week in a row, I've lost nothing (leaving my total inches lost at 4-1/2). I can look at it three ways:

(a) I should be happy, because I only worked out 4 days of the last seven, and given my metabolism, I should've blown up like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man;

(b) My body has found the weight it truly likes to be -- however, the weight I truly like to be is about 10 pounds less (I'm guessing -- I've been avoiding the scale), boding intense and possibly hostile negotiations between me and my body in the very near future; or

(c) The 1/16th of a mile that I've cut off of my usual running route during the last few weeks (so removed to avoid further "dumpling" incidents) is apparently critical to my fitness success, clearly establishing that construction-worker abuse is vital to any serious exercise regime.

Today, I choose (a).

In other news, this morning I met a woman I'd never met before for coffee. (For the purposes of this story, let's call this woman "Clementine," which isn't her real name, or even close, but didn't you just love Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind?). Clementine and I share a mutual friend in Houston, who suggested that Clementine contact me while visiting Trinidad to determine the country's "livability." Always happy to help a friend of a friend (and talk about Trinidad), I obliged.

It's always very interesting for me to talk to Americans about Trinidad, because I find myself feeling rather schizophrenic. On one hand, I spent the majority of my life in America, and in many ways, I understand what Americans value about their home country. On the other hand, even given my extended time away from Trinidad, I feel more Trini than American, and so I find myself "selling" Trinidad whenever I speak to non-Trinis. So even though I talked about the crime situation here (because, let's face it, Clementine was asking about residing in Trinidad, and unfortunately, you can't talk about life here without including some mention of crime), I ended up spending a majority of the time talking about the lovely people! Beautiful scenery! Amazing music! Vibrant art! The Soca Warriors, for heaven's sake! Then, afraid that perhaps my Trini bias was colouring my description to her a little too much, guilt moved me to suggest she talk to my friend Joanna, who recently moved here with her family, to get a truer version of what it's like to move here from another country. Hopefully, between the two of us, Clementine will get a somewhat accurate picture of what life in Trinidad is like.

The other thing that I noticed myself doing (which I know I do all the time), is while I was speaking to Clementine, my American accent came on strong. Having spent so much of my life in America, I can do an American accent without even thinking about it. And its tone? Completely nondescript. It's like Newscaster American -- there's no mistaking its origins in the United States, but you'd be hard-pressed to assign a particular state or region to it. It is, come to think of it, like Clementine's (and by "Clementine," I mean Kate Winslet's American accent from Eternal Sunshine, not the woman I met today, whose accent is clearly from the northeastern part of the United States). And yet, when I needed to speak to the waitstaff at the restaurant where we were having coffee, I slipped right into Trini. It's like being bilingual, without ever changing languages. At this point, I don't even know WHAT my natural accent is anymore.

So pity poor Alex, who, God help her, is surrounded by dozens of people speaking dozens of different ways to her. Her father has a distinctly Cornish accent, and I slip back and forth between Newscaster American and St. Joseph's Convent-girl Trini (there is, apparently, a special way girls who attended St. Joseph's Convent high school, as I did, speak, as compared to the rest of Trinidad). Celeste speaks to Alex in a rank Trinidadian accent. My parents speak to her in unspoiled Trini. Her schoolteacher is from Holland, though married to a Trini; and so she speaks to Alex with a Trinidadian accent slightly tinged with Dutch. All of Alex's friends at school are from both Trinidad and the rest of the world, but her best friend, Charlie, speaks with an Australian accent (though Charlie's grandmother, who Alex sees often enough, speaks to her with a Polish accent). Recently, anyone who meets Alex invariably asks me, "What is her accent?" My usual response: "Hell if I know."

Still, in a way, there's a part of me that is pretty proud of the fact that Alex is exposed to so many cultures in her day-to-day life -- I suspect very few children her age have such an international community at their disposal. But I can't help but also wonder to which country Alex will feel most of an affinity -- will she feel more English? Trini? American? Wherever we may end up moving next? I suppose time (and her accent) will tell.

In the meantime, Clementine (the woman I met today, not Kate Winslet), I hope I gave you the kind of information you were looking for. If the information seemed a bit random and disjointed, you now know why.

Comments

[Christopher]

I'm not sure how that links to the schizophrenia angle of it all. I think you meant split personality. Schizrophrenia isn't split personality disorder. That's different.

[Chookooloonks]

Christopher --

From Wikipedia:

A person experiencing untreated schizophrenia is typically characterized as demonstrating disorganized thinking...

... yeah. That.

K.

[Jessie]

I would love to hear yours, Alex' and Marcus' accents and compare!

[Chiada]

Yesterday I was waiting for my eye exam and I decided to pick up a somewhat trashy magazine to browse through while I waited. I came across an article that grabbed my attention. It was about this German girl who, from age 7 to 17 or so, was raised up by a cannibal tribe in Africa (I don't remember what the name of the people was). Her parents were linguists & she & her brother were raised up in that environment for a long time. Somewhere along the way, the family moved to the States and she talks about how scared they were & overwhelmed with all the choices, like how many kinds of potato chips there are or something, plus the noise and traffic and rules. She was used to be being a free bird among the tribe in Africa. The family moved back to Africa and she contined living there until her late teens when she was sent to a Swiss school so she could learn the Western ways and get an education. The experience left her confused, not knowing which was her true identity. This also reminds me of the character Ash in the book The Far Pavilions, who was raised in India but was actually British and spent equal time in both countries. It's interesting how some people face difficulties in determining their "identity" while others have no problem with it. Anyways, your post reminded me of that. I think it's great your daughter is raised around and exposed to so much culture. It's a wonderful privilege that not many people have.

[Amy]

It's lovely that Alex is surrounded by so many cultures. I used to teach in a middle school where the 600 students spoke over 30 languages in their homes. There was plenty of adolescent teasing and stuff, but it was never about a kid's accent, name, culture, etc. These kids thought little of how different they all were from each other and picked up bits of their friends' languages along the way. Now I teach in a school where the only 3 kids who are not of European descent are adopted children of white families. We have to create a sense of diversity by studying different, foreign cultures. I think they are slightly disadvantaged (unless they never leave Maine, which is the whitest state in the country).

[1girl2boys]

I think 4 1/2 inches is absolutely great. Especially for just the short amount of time you've doing this and not changing your eating at all. You're way ahead of me! Don't give up the running, I bet your body is loving the exercise. Keep away from the constuction zone though, that extra 1/16th mile isn't worth it. :)

[dave / higher powered]

I suspect Alex will ALWAYS be a Trini, no matter where she resides.
Although I 've never actually lived in TT, I have spent a number of months there over the past 17 years. I would recommend it to anyone. I've yet to find a country or region that doesn't have crime.

[Sandra Benoiton]

Just found your blog and feel like a treasure's been revealed. Parallel life thing happening...
I used to live in the US, but have been in Seychelles for the past decade plus, so also an islander.
My kids, three and a half and 14 months, are going to end up with strange accents in all the languages they'll speak, as they also have varied input.
Wish I could say I share your loss of 4 1/2 inches this week, but that would be stretching it!
I look forward to catching up.

[Kari]

I've been in Florida for just four years, but I learned quickly how to reform my Trini accent and articulate it differently so I can be understood.

When I'm on the phone with my parents, family and friends from home, I slip easily back into the dialect, but when I'm around Americans, I go back to this mix between the "Convent" accent and clipped Trini-American speak.

To my American friends, my Trini accent is still unmistakeable, yet when I go home, my Trini friends tease me about how American I sound.

You're right, it's like being bilingual, but accentwise.

[marian]

That is a GORGEOUS photo. And I'm realizing I know nothing whatsoever about Trinidad. Will have to do some reading!

[twyla]

it is great to be able to raise children in such a diverse and accepting manner. My daughter was just telling me that last week my grandson (6 yrs) was trying to tell her about a classmate, and he was describing this other little boy in many and various ways and she finally realized the one thing that Caleb never said to describe the other kid? he is black. What a world it would be if race/ethnicity was our first descriptor, not that there is anything wrong with using this to describe a person, but there is really so much more about a person that this one thing!