Wednesday, October 28, 2009

What is your language?

Languages are something that have intrigued me since I won first place in a spanish competition in 10th grade. I enjoy playing with words within the English language as well as the handful of other languages I have brushed across in my lifetime.

For example, OoloreyLA (and thats the phonetic spelling, not anything actually accurate), in my Nigerian friend's native tribe's tounge is one of the most fun words I've come across. I asked her to teach me one word and OoloreyLA was it. I finally got the meaning out of her after I practiced it multiple times.

"Well," she says incredulously, "It means Big Head."

The first time I ran into a Nigerian other than my friend was paying for parking at the airport. Upon learning of her origin I got so excited and started screaming OoloreyLA at her, waving my hands and widening my eyes looking for her excitement to recognize her native language. She merely looked slightly taken aback and laughed at the silly white girl across from her and handed me my change. My friend never told me that was not a good idea to scream Big Head at her fellow Nigerians. Who knew?

Another family of languages intrigues me outside of those just spoken. Love languages. Gary Chapman wrote a book about these called The Five Love Languages, first introducing it to the world. Its basically about the way we show and receive love.

The five love languages according to Chapman are:
  • Personal Touch
  • Acts of Services
  • Giving of Gifts
  • Quality Time
  • Words of Encouragement
You can research the gist of the book on the internet if the face value of these aren't enough to quench your thirst but they are self explanatory enough on a surface level to get my drift. Or you can be an over achiever and take the love language test here.

So anyway, in college, I decided my love language was physical touch. Any touch was just an opening for the warm fuzzies and fair game to bring home and analyze for hours with my roommate. Later, when I was dating someone less talkative and more touchy feely, I decided my love language was words of encouragement. I would ask each time before we got off the phone, "Tell me something nice, please."

Now, I'm dating another personal touch person and have decided Acts of Service is more my game. I mean, I melt when he takes out the trash and weed eats my yard. Or, when he is scurrying around my feet picking up all I dropped on the floor in the kitchen. But, I also really dug him bringing me flowers. And I really long for our time together...

So, with all that changing of my mind, I finally decided which one I actually am. All 5. That's right, I said it. I am penta-lingual. Perhaps thats why men rarely appeal to me because rather than having one overarching need for feeling love, I instead have five enormous, love needs that pose incredible hurtles when it comes to dating me.

But, rather than look at the downside, I'm actually feeling pretty good about this, actually I'm rather elated. How cool is it that I am penta-lingual? I mean, think about how many people you know that speak 5 languages. Um, like, .02? And if you did know someone, I bet they would just be the coolest chick/kid ever! So, not only do I receive love in 5 ways, I also can give it in 5 ways.

So, my task now is to purposefully show my love to Harry in the 5 specific ways this weekend and see what his reaction is. And, gauge mine. Then, we can see if I really am what I have just claimed to be. I will report back later...

Kisses!