{"id":51,"date":"2018-08-16T01:25:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-16T01:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/2018\/08\/16\/2019-1-2-one-word-for-too-many-things-the-you-and-the-i-love-you\/"},"modified":"2018-08-16T01:25:00","modified_gmt":"2018-08-16T01:25:00","slug":"2019-1-2-one-word-for-too-many-things-the-you-and-the-i-love-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/2018\/08\/16\/2019-1-2-one-word-for-too-many-things-the-you-and-the-i-love-you\/","title":{"rendered":"One Word for Too Many Things, The You and The I Love You"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

As an immigrant living in the United States I never cease to learn English in a way I never thought I would. I considered myself fluent in this language, since I can engage in any conversation, on pretty much any subject. But, one thing I started realizing right after I moved and started having a \u201creal life\u201d here, not as a tourist, but just as a ordinary person living the ordinary life.<\/h3>\n

Many things got a real different perception and perspective to me. Ways I always thought words and sentences would mean gained such a deeper understanding. It was hard. It is still.<\/h3>\n

I have seen myself thinking that I was completely aware of everything people were saying, since I knew what their words were. However, I would never imagine in many occasions I did not get what they really meant.<\/h3>\n

One Word for too many things<\/strong><\/h1>\n

I had a problem with my car. So, I drove to one of the many auto parts in my town. Getting there, I realized that I had no knowledge of car mechanics vocabulary. I knew every word, but I had no clue a lot of them would be applied to what they were, and the way they were.<\/h3>\n

\u201cSir, you have a bad coil\u201d.<\/h3>\n

I just said: \u201cOK\u201d. Because this is what you say when you do not understand what they said fully. A coil can be a million things. Literally. Just Google it. To me, coil mainly is a roll of something, in my case, a steel coil, which is the primary material used in what I do, which is steel buildings. <\/h3>\n

Now, how did this word end up at a car engine as one os its parts? Guess what? There I was searching for something that would look like the coil I am familiar with, but in such a small version. Of course, it had nothing to do with what I was expecting it to be.<\/h3>\n

This is one of the things I am constantly learning. Words in English can be applied to a lot of different things.<\/h3>\n

Briefly, let me give another example. Slab. Again, I deal with construction and many years ago when I went to South Africa for a course I learned this word as being the foundation of a house or a building. But not. A few months ago talking to a field installer, he said the rough opening of a door was wrong because it was exactly the same size as the slab. <\/h3>\n

I am like \u201cthis dude is really under something heavy\u2026 The guy is saying the door opening is the same size of a 15,000 sqft building?\u201d. Wrong again. There is this thing called door slab, which is the door itself, which is what I learned to be called door many years ago, which, which, which\u2026 which.<\/h3>\n

I wonder: what else can be a slab? Chocolate bar? Maybe.<\/h3>\n

You<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Don\u2019t get it personal. The you may not be the you, like the you yourself. Let me explain. At least I will try.<\/h3>\n

You in English can be singular or plural and you get it from the context, right? Yes, but not so. People use you as a generic way of referencing something to somebody, but not necessarily you that is listening. Example:<\/h3>\n

\u201cLeo, then what you do is make things work the way they were supposed to be.\u201d<\/h3>\n

The statement above, out of context, may be clear to you. But on a given occasion, it was not to me. There is this hypothetical you. When hearing similar sentences I was feeling frustrated because I had nothing to do with whatever that was! <\/h3>\n

How were I supposed to worry about or do something that was not even on my radar? I told you. Hard to explain. But remember: The You may not be you yourself, but the Hypothetical You. Don\u2019t get it personal. It is not. Believe me.<\/h3>\n

I Love You<\/strong><\/h1>\n

I don\u2019t say I love you. At least not in the frequency way people here in Texas do. Let me explain. I come from Brazil. We typically don\u2019t say I Love You on a regular basis (like, every 4 sentences). We show. We hug, kiss, hug again, touch each other, in this almost weird way when I think about it more and more. <\/h3>\n

But we don\u2019t say I Love You when we are really saying good bye, especially to a person who is not real intimate to you. It is a process, an act of bravery, a step by step thing process that culminates in \u201cEu te amo\u201d. I am serious. If you say that to somebody in Brazil, depending on the day, light and music background, people will cry (deeply). For real.<\/h3>\n

So, here I am just trying to plug into some new friendships and E.V.E.R.Y time people are saying this sentence and I am like thinking like\u2026 \u201cWell\u2026 I don\u2019t\u2026 because\u2026 I guess\u2026 I don\u2019t know you really!\u201d. I am more used to it now, but come on! How can you say you love someone like that? I still don\u2019t get it.<\/h3>\n

But guess what. After a few months I did the same thing. That was shocking to me. Minute of silence. Wondered \u201cI never said I Love You to any of my best friends\u201d and I just did it to a new friend. Forgive me old friends. You are still in my heart and you know that.<\/h3>\n

This will always be a learning journey. I will try to be more disciplined in writing. As we say here in Texas\u2026<\/h3>\n

Love y\u2019all.<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As an immigrant living in the United States I never cease to learn English in a way I never thought I would. I considered myself fluent in this language, since I can engage in any conversation, on pretty much any subject. But, one thing I started realizing right after I moved and started having a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life-sessions"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/loopfiction.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}