It seems scarcely believable how fast the summer has gone, with August nigh upon us. Time flies when you get into a routine. Pretty much every weekday looks fairly similar:

6:45—Alarm goes. Much groaning ensues.

6:51—I finally get out of bed. More groaning.

6:52-7:16—Teeth brushed/face shaved/clothes donned. (This should take about five minutes in total, but when time spent staring blankly into space and grumbling is accounted for, it winds up being substantially more).

~7:45—Breakfast.

~8:10—Leave for school in bicycle (unless it’s Thursday, in which case I’m probably feeling REALLY unmotivated and take the bus).

8:30—Arrive at Regent dripping in sweat, almost in time for class to start.

8:30-9:00—We take our daily quiz, and then Curtis has fun telling us to do random things in Hebrew. It basically looks like preschoolers playing Simon Says, except that we are much older, and have much slower response times.

9:00-10:00—Grammar lesson. Did you know that Hebrew has seven different verbal stems? All Hebrew verbs have a three-consonant root, but then you put different vowels before, after, and between these letters to tell you the verb’s person, gender, and number. To make things more exciting, Hebrew verbs are also inflected for gender, so the word for “says” is different, depending on whether it’s “he says” or “she says.” And just in case you feel bored by the simple task of memorizing dozens of three-letter roots that (to the untrained ear) sound more-or-less identical, and then learning the verbal patterns to help those make sense, Hebrew also has seven different “constructs” or larger verb patterns which add different nuance or significance to the basic meaning of the verb. For example, for the single verb root PQD, you have the Qal pattern, which is active indicative (“he appointed/visited”), and the Niphal, which is passive (“he was appointed/visited”); then, you have the Piel, Pual, and Hitpael patterns, which somewhat modify and usually intensify this basic meaning (“he mustered/counted/was punished/was counted/etc”). Finally, you have the Hiphil and the Hophal, which are causative (“he caused to appoint/be appointed”). If you made it to the end of this paragraph, you have done substantially better than I do most mornings. I need coffee.

10:00-10:15—Coffee break…which, for me, usually winds up meaning “10-minute nap break.” The library very considerately has several bean-bags in a corner which have become my Hebrew Hibernation Hole.

10:15-11:00—Refreshed and restored from my library power nap, I return to class to do some sort of integrative activity: either translation in groups, or parsing, or (on fun days), dramas. Our group usually wins for most enthusiastic performance.

11:00-12:00—Chapel break…which also, for me, usually means “45-minute nap break.” Except for some special days when I feel really motivated. (These don’t happen very often).

12:00-1:00—Return to Hebrew. The last hour is spent working right out of the biblical text, and this is where we can see what we’ve learned. We’re basically just set loose on the text and have to use however much we know of the grammar to try and piece together what it means. At the end of class, Curtis explains it. It’s exciting to see how much we’ve learned; we’ve already gone through Genesis 1, and are working our way through the book of Ruth.

1:00-2:00 Eat lunch, attempt to memorize vocabulary for the following day.

2:00-2:45 Go home, take another nap (I have become quite a proficient napper this summer), resume homework.

The rest of the afternoon/evening (Order varies): spend another few hours on Hebrew; play Beethoven on the piano to vent my frustrations; attempt to do some (non-Hebrew) writing; make dinner (or, later in the week, decide that I’m too lazy to make dinner, and buy sushi instead); go to bed. Repeat.

It has been, on the whole, a very good summer, and both of my summer courses have been good experiences. Additionally, I’ve been able to get to know more of my schoolmates than I did all last year; there’s a house of Regent guys (dubbed the “monastery”) about four blocks from my place that has potlucks every Thursday. (Even if I share my father’s general aversion to “fellowshipping,” my aversion to socializing is almost always overcome by my desire for free food.) Our house has potlucks every Wednesday night. Saturday mornings, several of us have been using the space in our yard to try a vegetable garden, and we’ve had great success so far with peas, spinach, and radishes, with beans, radishes, parsely, oregano, chard, lettuce, and lots of tomatoes on the way. It’s a very satisfying feeling to go out and pick your dinner, knowing that you’ve grown it.

That said, I am very tired, and looking forward to a break. I miss you all. I miss having a home. This is a great place to be, but it isn’t home. Please, if you feel so motivated, feel free to tell me how you are doing. Things have been a bit lonely up here, and I always enjoy keeping up and being reminded that I’m not really alone.

Two amusing anecdotes to conclude. First off, inspired by my housemates this past spring, I once again took up my on-again, off-again hobby of knitting, which is a convenient way of keeping my hands occupied while my mind is busy with other things. I had taken my latest project to a few of the evening public lectures at Regent. Then, one morning, a Chinese woman approached me and, in broken English, asked me if I would be willing to send me a picture of her “do the needle thing;” she said that she taught courses back in China, and wanted a visual example of breaking gender stereotypes. I’m not quite sure whether I’m flattered or embarrassed. After all, I’m using two large sharp objects to tie lots of knots; what could be more masculine than that?

Second, yesterday several of us took a beautiful 30-mile bike ride to a place called Deep Cove. The only hitch for me was that, on the way back, we came to a stop light, and, predictably, my feet got stuck on my pedals and I bit the ground. I got up, slightly embarrassed, but (I thought) none the worse for wear. Five minutes later, a passer-by informed me that I was bleeding from a deep gash in my leg. I looked down, and sure enough, my sock was soaked through. I went home, bandaged it up, and went to a friend’s house. Afterwards, we walked a ways to watch a fireworks show. That was a mistake. My bandage started bleeding again, and by the time I walked back home (barefoot) I looked like something that had escaped from a zombie apocalypse. Today, fortunately, besides walking around like a peg-leg pirate, nothing more has happened. However, I feel like this kind of bike wound is roughly analogous to shooting yourself in the foot. It may leave a scar, but it’s not one that you can readily brag about.