Chapter 7 | 71
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attling off idiom after idiom in her own unknowable tongue—whichConstantin said was the most difficult part, because the Russiansdidn’t have the same idioms as our idioms—and I wished with all myheart I could crawl into her and spend the rest of my life barkingout one idiom after another. It mightn’t make me any happier, butit would be one more little pebble of efficiency among all the otherpebbles. Then Constantin and the Russian girl interpreter and the wholebunch of black and white and yellow men arguing down therebehind their labelled microphones seemed to move off at a distance.I saw their mouths going up and down without a sound, as if theywere sitting on the deck of a departing ship, stranding me in themiddle of a huge silence. I started adding up all the things I couldn't do. I began with cooking. My grandmother and my mother were such good cooks that I lefteverything to them. They were always trying to teach me one dishor another, but I would just look on and say, “Yes, yes, I see,’ whilethe instructions slid through my head like water, and then I'd alwaysspoil what I did so nobody would ask me to do it again. I remember Jody, my best and only girl-friend at college in myfreshman year, making me scrambled eggs at her house onemorning. They tasted unusual, and when I asked her if she had putin anything extra, she said cheese and garlic salt. 1 asked who toldher to do that, and she said nobody, she just thought it up. But then,she was practical and a sociology major. I didn’t know shorthand either. This meant I couldn't get a good job after college. My motherkept telling me nobody wanted a plain English major. But an Englishmajor who knew shorthand was something else again. Everybodywould want her. She would be in demand among all the up-and-coming young men and she would transcribe letter after thrillingletter. The trouble was, I hated the idea of serving men in any way.I wanted to dictate my own thrilling letters. Besides, those little 72 | The Bell Jar shorthand symbols in the book my mother showed me seemed justas bad as let t equal time and let s equal the total distance.
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