Monday Morning Musings

It’s curious when the structure of a second language works its way suifficiently into you that your first language seems strange.

“I am very sick,” said the note that Raf left on the stove last night.

And he was. I was woken at 5AM by the sound of it all—an alarming and unsettling way to begin the day.

And several hours later, I’m uncaffeinated or perhaps precaffeinated and wondering—what does that mean?

In Spanish, he would have written, “estoy muy enfermo.” (Actually, in good Puerto Rican Spanish, he would have written, “estoy bien enfermo.”)

There are, you see, two verbs in Spanish for the verb “to be” in English. And if Raf had written, “yo soy enfermo?”

He would have confessed—I’m one sick dude.

The verb ser—as in “soy enfermo”—is used to denote permanent characteristics, natural states. The verb estar is used to denote passing, temporary states. Soy feliz—I’m a happy kind of guy. Estoy feliz—right now I’m happy.

Well, I knew all of this because Ofelia had told me, those decades ago when I was putting my three words of Spanish together and seeing looks of blank confusion on the faces of my auditors. And she—a better teacher than I—gave me a very nice example. Listen carefully—a person says estoy casado—I’m married.

Not a good sign. Clear implication—right now I’m married….

Soy casado—you must meet my wife!

What Ofelia didn’t tell me, but what I figured out later, is that this all comes from Latin—duh!—and gets into Spanish, Portuguese, and Catalan. The verb ser in modern Spanish comes from esse in Latin. The verb estar in Spanish comes from the Latin stare.

Stare has the literal meaning of to stand. And it can be used that way—think the Stabat Mater, Mary standing by the side of the cross.

But it can be used more figuratively—“as things stand now” or “let’s see how that stands….”

These verbs, by the way, are copulas or copulative verbs. Of course, when I learned them—in a gentler, more refined time—nobody would have used the term. “Linking verb” was the term used. (Though it might be kind of fun to make the experiment, slide up to a babe at the bar, and whisper, “Hey, baby, you wanna link?”)

And the development of the ser / estar distinction took place late. Here’s a page—thanks, Wikipedia!—from Cantar del Mio Cid. Check out the third line, which reads Es pagado e davos su amor. Today it would be Está satisfecho, y la da su favor. (He is satisfied, and gives you his favor.)

The other curious factor is location. Notice that the three languages that develop the copulae are in the remote backwater of the Iberian Peninsula. Everybody else—with a few exceptions—generally continues to use their verb to be as did the Latin.

Well, it isn’t much of a post, this. I’ve not added anything significant to your day. But I did remember a poem with the “thus in the winter stands a lonely tree.” And that haunted me for a bit.

Looked it up, and here it is:

What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why

BY EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY

What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,

I have forgotten, and what arms have lain

Under my head till morning; but the rain

Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh

Upon the glass and listen for reply,

And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain

For unremembered lads that not again

Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.

Thus in the winter stands the lonely tree,

Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,

Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:

I cannot say what loves have come and gone,

I only know that summer sang in me

A little while, that in me sings no more.