Class Two...'er' verbs

Unbeknownst to me, French has a handful of irregular verbs, and a whole host of "er" verbs. The "er" verbs follow a particular conjugation pattern. 

parler (to speak)
je (I)	parle	nous (we)	parlons
tu (you, inf)	parles	vous (you, formal)	parlez
il/elle/on (he/she one)	parle	ils/elles (they)	parlent

 

manger (to eat)
je (I)	mange	nous (we)	mangeons
tu (you, inf)	manges	vous (you, formal)	mangez
il/elle/on (he/she one)	mange	ils/elles (they)	mangent

Je parle francais. Ok, that's aspirational. But I am limited in my French and cannot tell you I would like to speak French, so for now, I speak French. I promise, this will get better.

But being able to manger is even more important, because I very much would like to eat while I am in Paris.

Even though the pattern seems simple, it's not natural for me - and mostly, my brain wants to conjugate everything in German, a language I studied for several years between high school and college. And I am struggling, reader, knowing that emptying my brain of German is probably the best way to free my brain up for learning another language. 

I will recount my crowning Deutsch achievement. Many years ago, while traveling in Austria, I did my very best to draw on German whenever I could. My children were amazed (they were young - it's easy to impress). We most certainly did not ride the sleeper train, we rode the Schlafwagen - and when there was an argument between two locals when a woman with a baby carriage attempted to board der Bus but someone was in the space for carriages, she let them know the Kinderwagon had precedence and as a young parent, I agreed! By the end of the trip, I was not being offered tours in English - guides assumed I was versed enough in German and would speak as if that were the case. And then, exhausted by travel, we got in a taxi and the driver preferred to not take our group because we were planning just a short drive. And I assure you, when he dismissed us in Duetsch, I took it up a notch and both of my children looked approvingly and in awe as they cemented in their mind that their Mutter could yell at people in zwei languages! 

I have heard from friends that when learning a language, it's natural for a brain to draw the first foreign word it knows, even if it's the complete wrong language. And it definitely seems like ich spreche another language but I want to parle that language so badly.

My class is pretty quiet but it's only four weeks long - so I still consider it a good introduction.

Off to work on my devoir!

Elaine