BGM: The Beatles - The Long And Winding Road
Sometimes I am asked as this - "how many years have you been learning English?" TBH, now I am 49, and I started learning it at 13, when I was a junior high school student (in Japan, the people who belong to our generation usually started learning English like that.) And after the high school period, I went to a university to study English literature (especially American literature as Beatniks etc.) From 13 to 49... Therefore I have learned English for over 35 years. But, during that long period I have some "blanks". At that "blanks", I literally had done nothing but drinking. So I can't be proud of it.
Recently, someone asked to others like this - "I'd like to master English to enjoy the daily conversation!". I guess... although (I wish this wouldn't sound ironic) I have learned English for such a long time, I couldn't do order a cup of coffee at any coffee shops like Starbucks by using English. I won't tell any lies about this. At the daily conversation, any small talks, I need a certain skill of listening, speaking, and remembering various pieces of knowledge.
Then, how can I afford the person as any actual, useful advice? I can't see... But, I might be able to say this. As you can see, I am never a fluent speaker. Even in Japanese, I am never good at doing communication (my stories often go really complicated/difficult in the end.) But, I try to have a certain will to enjoy the conversation with an open mind. How can I enjoy the talking to the precious, great other people? With that open mind, I let myself into the flood of words with having great pieces of The Beatles philosophy - "Let It Be" and "All You Need Is Love."
But as a reader who reads Ludwig Wittgenstein, even now I have been haunted by this idea. "Really? My English is really easy for others to accept? What if all I have written can be just a kind of gobbledygook?" Oh, what a silly idea. "You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one"... I'm sorry! Like that, today I have thought that kind of stupid things as a tiny pupil/disciple of philosophy.
