Since I don't speak nearly often enough about the German part of this, I'm going to talk a little bit about that today. I've been working very hard on my German, especially lately and it's been showing. I've found myself starting to translate a lot of what I think or say into German just to see if I can. I've also been attempting to not have a panic attack when using German with native speakers and I'm actively seeking out people with whom I can speak German on a more frequent basis. I've come a long way in 8 months and I'm very excited about it. Hopefully it continues.
I think that since I started trying to do all of these things (the learning German, the eating healthier, etc.) I've learned a whole bunch about myself. For this whole time, the working out and eating healthy has been the hardest. Even with the schedule that I have now, I still find it difficult to do all the things I want to do. It's never been a challenge for me to continue to work on my German though. It's easy to tell that I'm making progress and I really enjoy learning the language. I'm never put off of it by coming across German that I don't understand, but I see it as a challenge and something to improve upon. I think it's crazy that I can go back and read emails that were written in German that I had to spend an hour translating when I first got them and now I don't even have to think about what's being said. I know I have a long way to go, but I love that I am getting better.
Since the beginning of the year (or maybe since we moved to Nebraska) Mr. Leick and myself have been talking about what we really want to do with our lives. He's fortunate enough to have found his calling and he is doing what he loves every single day. I really enjoy my job, but it's not something I see myself doing every day for the rest of my life. This came up again tonight when I started speaking in German to my dear husband. It drives him crazy (but he thinks it's hilarious) when I start muttering in German (which happens embarrassingly often) but this time I was actually speaking to him in the language. He kept wanting to know what I was saying and I was trying to help him figure it out but I was getting nowhere, so I just told him what I was saying (that I thought it would be fun to speak only in German to him so that he would learn). He disagreed because he is no fun, but he just kind of looked at me and then went off on a bit of a rant that, quite frankly, I needed to hear. It went something like this, "You are very good at German and very smart and not many people could make the progress you have only doing this mostly by themselves. You clearly love the language and love to learn it and I could see you teaching it. It's something you're passionate about and you should do what you LOVE, not what you like."
I've spent a bit of time looking at programs to learn German to see what my options are. As it turns out, UNO has a program for teaching English as a second language. Anyone who knows me (or at least looks at my Facebook ever) knows that my love of Austria knows no bounds. I realize that I'm probably putting it on something of a pedestal, but I love it there and would love nothing more than to live there. I know that Omaha was the goal of this blog, but I dislike so much about America and I think we've got it all wrong a lot of the time. Omaha is amazing in and of itself but I want out of America, and Matt's hopped on the bandwagon. I think our chat this evening about what I should do and what I should try to achieve really made us both realize that there's so much more we BOTH can do and we shouldn't be limited by city limits or state lines or even oceans. Maybe my love of the German language is just what we needed to throw caution to the wind and say that the world will be our oyster.
Granted, this will take time. First I have to get to the point where my German is good enough that I can apply for and get into the program and then I have to actually pass and everything, but it's a good goal. It's something to strive for. I think one of the things that I'm most looking forward to is that Matt said that if I do this - go for the master's degree and everything - I will be able to study abroad. The fact that I didn't while I was at Truman is probably the biggest regret that I have from college. For something I want this badly, and something that Matt wants for me and for us, I think the only question is timing. It might take awhile but it's something we're going to do. The ultimate goal is for me to get a job in a Austria (ideally in Vienna, but really anywhere in Austria would be perfect...I'd even settle for Germany) teaching English to high school aged students. The best part is that Matt really can take his skills anywhere (he does things with a computer...don't ask me what) and he thinks learning German would be fun, which is good because eventually he'll probably need to speak it, especially if we're living in Austria or Germany.
So that's the plan and that's where we've come after 8 months of me learning German. I'm glad that I have a wonderful husband who is open to my crazy ideas and who will support me no matter what. I guess that I have a new goal for this blog now: to do all of the things I've talked about in this post. Plus still the weight loss thing.
Anyway, I've been rambling on for awhile now and I need to get some sleep. Hopefully this is actually coherent! On that note, have a good night.
Tschüss!