I find I can still be surprised when I meet people (Norwegians) who are into books who don’t read English effortlessly. Odd, really, since it happens all the time, and I ought to know by now. It all comes of learning English so early, I suppose – it’s second nature by now (I think in English as often as I do in Norwegian), and it’s hard to remember ever finding it difficult. Just like I can’t actually remember learning to read, I seem to have been able to read all my life (which I know for a fact is not true, I just can’t remember the fact). I must have found English difficult at some point, though – I can remember being horrified at my mother buying The Chronicles of Narnia for me in English, rather than Norwegian, when we moved to the Gambia and I was adamant I could’t survive for a year without them (I had been borrowing them from the library in Norwegian every few months). Now I’m very glad she did.
(Oh, and I know I still make the odd mistake – but I make the odd mistake in Norwegian, too, and I’m also more often lost for words in my native language; scary, really.)
Music in my head: Breakfast at Tiffany’s (started the book at breakfast)