It does what it says on the label
During Covid, I bought hand soap, and, on the label, it told you in three languages how “to wash your hands” in excruciating detail. Well, I suppose there’s always a first time and that’s generally when you’re a tiny little girl or boy, so reading (not that size of print) isn’t generally in at that age, but German children didn’t need to worry because it says quite clearly “keep out of the reach of children” and, while that’s fairly understandable for things that are colourful and drinkable, the German for “keep out of the reach of children” is “keep out of the hands of children” and that, of course isn’t exactly the point of hand soap. But, that is what they say you have to say on the labels of things that are colourful and that children could drink. It should say “keep out of the mouths of children”, but that’s what they say about pearls of wisdom.
During Covid, my person-to-person contacts were limited to the Bofrost man, who brought me my victuals regularly every three weeks, and the odd bottle of very good wine, the occasional Amazon delivery boy, a neighbour who wanted me to sign a petition against the disco on the other side of the railway, which bothers us more than the 6-5 special that zooms past on the rails (little did we know it was about to be laid low for quite a while - but not the trains, which rolled on by, totally empty, throughout the duration), three entirely illicit dinner guests one balmy summer evening, who all sat at regulation distance, though the regulation wasn’t yet in force – at the time it was 75 kilometres – and my neighbour whose husband was euthanised a few years back and I thought needed the company more than I needed to be protected from Covid. Covid did one thing more than anything else – it rejigged our priorities. For 18 months, it did, but now we’ve rejigged them all back again, as if disease no longer exists.
In Germany, I was told by my German tutor at the University that “Du bist ein sprachliches Chamäleon – you’re a linguistic chameleon; I was fairly good at repeating what was in my surroundings, but I need to be able to visualise what I’m saying. I used to say “Putin” in French as if it was “putain”, which is a “bitch” or “whore” until I saw it written in French, and it’s got an “e” at the end, so, that was a bit disappointing, actually. They say “Puteen”, like illicit Irish liquor. Well, they will lick him one day.
People say they never know where I’m going with my writing, but I do. It’s a magical mystery tour, where the driver knows exactly what the destination is, but the passengers don’t, with landscape that’s entrancing – well you may well be falling asleep by now – but the point is this (that’s the phrase you can jump to if you don’t like long journeys): I used to talk right posh – I got ribbed for it at school, because I was dragged up good and proper, I was, and today the chameleons among you may discern that a Yorkshire muse has descended upon me and I can’t for the life of me tell you why. I spoke good German in Germany because there were lots of Germans there to assimilate to. And in Covid, my Scottish accent descended upon me from back in Edinburgh and Glasgow days. I think it annoys the tits off people who knew me before and think I’m acting now. But I’m not – I was acting then. My brothers went to live in Australia, and the near east and Essex and Cambridgeshire and would be shocked if I told them they speak like Harry Campion or Dame Edna or even like the folk we all grew up amongst, Geoff Boycott and Michael Parkinson.
Well, God moves in mysterious ways, and sometimes he puts on an accent. Maybe that’s it. He’s moving you right now to get your thinking cap on, because, well, there has to be a bit of a two-way street here.