Translator’s Notes

It’s been quite some time since I added anything to this “blog” of mine. There are many reasons for that, including a personal tragedy in my life regarding the person I had felt (in a way) this blog was dedicated to. My potential audience has shrunk by a considerable factor of one, and at the moment I am not under any illusions that there is anyone lined up to take this person’s place (in any sense of the word), or that there ever will be.

Nonetheless, life goes on for those of us remaining. Work goes on. The cursing at the computer when images freeze before our eyes, the small smile we allow ourselves at the end of a job when we truly feel we have done our best (and it shows), the shocked, unbelieving glares we hurl almost physically at the screen (eyes popping open, jaw aiming for the floor) in the hopes of some miraculous change of the words in response when faced with a source text of unmitigated horror (be it due simply to the mangled writing quality that seems for some reason to be so prevalent among authors in the employ of paying clients, or simply the truth of the amount of work staring back at us), the sighs of slight disappointment knowing that we are about to sacrifice what little relaxation time we had cued up for a client that simply says “please, we need you”, the satisfaction of completing a double-shift or long working weekend and receiving compliments galore from the client… yes, work goes on.

And weaving in and out among all these things is time. We don’t see it, and often we don’t sense it – it just passes us by. We think in the future (when is this job due, when is the next job due, how long do I have to finish it?), and when we look up, the present is gone. I don’t know for certain, but I am inclined to believe this happens to many in this profession.

Living in the moment is difficult, reserved for those few hours a day – if we’re very, very lucky – that our thoughts aren’t churning on the topics of clients, jobs, phrases, definitions, research, and deadlines. If we’re unlucky, this simply doesn’t happen.

But our work is interesting, challenging, stimulating, and moving. We feel like we are constantly learning, constantly pushing ourselves to be better, and constantly striving to outdo ourselves.

These things leave little time for “blogging”.

And so I’ve made a decision to start a Facebook page for my business. The page is here:

www.facebook.com/Language2Language

For me, what this means is simply a change from thinking about writing an “article” about my thoughts, to simply summing them up in an apt phrase, comment, or opinion. It’s easier and faster, and just as easy for anyone out there to reply with a comment or opinion of their own.

At this point, I don’t see it as a substitute for this blog, which will remain here, beckoning. It’s simply another, different vehicle for being “out there” – in the virtual (if not the real) world – instead of “in here” – at my desk, in my office, locked away from everyone else.

Hopefully I will have the chance and the time (“make the time”, as we are told) to continue to write well-considered blog articles in the future, and hopefully not too far in the future.

But for the time being, if there is anyone out there who might be interested in a slightly more lively exchange, I invite you to stop by my Facebook page, and see what’s happening in the virtual world of translation.