It's been tough, what with the heat and being cross with the world in general. But needs must. Two weeks to go until the MRI, I try not to think of it or rather I imagine that nothing will come of it.
Anyway, I could and should post pictures of the gorgeous garden and the abundance of blossoms and fruit and goodies we harvest every morning. But needs must. The squirrels come early to drink from the bird bath and the robins are by now so used to us, they mess about in the water when we are close by. This morning we gave away the grandchild's paddling pool to a very happy young family.
So I've been contemplating Ellen's brilliant series of life in 100 objects. I don't think I have 100 objects in me. But I'll start with #1. In fact a group of four objects. For several years, these heavy tombs were opened and perused daily, in the days before the internet.
I started my bilingual life when I was 21 years old, the year I fell in love with R who speaks English and Irish and French and some Swahili but at the time, not a word of German. A few years into this adventure, I started to get asked for translations, nothing official, basic touristy, small business stuff. Favours really. I did not feel confident to think of it as a career option.
My first translation job came from an arrogant German business man working for the World Bank while we were living in Africa. He promised riches and success to all and nothing came of it. Of course, he forgot to pay me before he left in a hurry. So, for many years, I stuck to favours and translated for NGOs, small environmental campaigns, women's groups, the odd alternative conference and so on. Until one day, a customer at the food co-op where I was working asked me if I wanted to apply for her job at the university because she was moving abroad. Two weeks later - that is 25 years ago now - I was at a desk with a pile of medical manuscripts to read, translate and/or edit. Learning by doing never felt more real. And urgent.
Language and science had been my worst subjects in school. While I was pretty much bilingual by now, I did not have any grammar knowledge, no idea about simple present, present continuous, present perfect and so on. I pasted a sheet with the standard proofreading symbols on the notice board above the desk and got myself a nice range of fine coloured markers. This was all in the days before the internets and Microsoft Word and I quickly learned whose manuscripts I could mark in red and who of the hard working researchers had hidden school traumas requiring purple or green marking.
To this day, I know next to nothing about science and medical research in particular. Thankfully, I figured out early on that what matters was grammar and style and that content was none of my business. I suppose it would help to understand the rudimentary concepts of supernatant and precipitate or what PCR stands for and why mass spectrometry is such an important analytical technique but even after 25 years all I can offer are my excellent bullshitting skills. If a long sentence has to be shortened, and that is often the case, it helps to subsitute the big words with simple ones and reading it out loud. Also, living with a science teacher has enormous benefits.
But as I knew early on that reading English novels, watching English tv series and arguing in English with a teenage daughter and a stubborn husband would not be sufficient, I went back to university to study translation. After some persuasion which included a gruesome conversation exam and two written tests, I managed to skip the first two of a four year distant education degree in business English. I wanted to specialise in science English but I was one of only four applicants and the university did not want to waste funds on such a small number. So for two years I studied All The Grammar, wrote countless essays and sweated through exams. During lunch hours, I studied index cards on vocabulary and comma rules. Throughout the course, we had been expected to diligently read The Economist and The Financial Times to remain up to date on business lingo. I haven't looked at a single page of either of these since. My last exam day was on the eve of 9/11 and the final test was a two hour long oral grilling on current business news items. One day later and I would have struggled with lots of new vocabulary. I got my degree in the post three weeks later.
My translating career came to an end at the right time, I have been lucky to retire just as AI and all its translation tools arrived. It seems so easy - and in many ways it really is - but it also is a tricky minefield.
I still don't understand a thing about medical research but I have come to respect the detail and care that goes into research, often beginning with minute puzzle pieces that seem to suddenly fall into place with amazing results, like the development of potential MS treatments, groundbreaking insights into our immune system, early detection of pancreatic cancer and DNA sequencing (don't ask, still no idea) and novel treatment in liver diseases.
I can find my name in google scholar and the NHI pubmed database thanks to the acknowledgments some, but not all, authors have generously expressed for my editorial work. I can recite the main rules of the AMA Style Guide probably for ever. Some days, this feels like an achievement. But just one of many others in my life. But it has been a great time. This may sound weird, what with no science background, but it felt I was in my element (get it?).
