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To Be or To Be
Lessons in impermanence
A few nights ago I woke in the small hours with verbs dissolving on my tongue. I had been dreaming in Portuguese, metabolizing language lessons in my sleep.
In waking life the pieces don’t come together so effortlessly. I’ve been wrestling with ser and estar. To be and to be. My mother tongue has no equivalent of this disparity. In English we just are or we are not. In Portuguese, as in Spanish and Italian and who knows how many other languages, there are different ways to be.
Ser is a permanent state of being, something that cannot be changed — or cannot be changed easily. Sou a LaDonna. Sou americana. Sou escritora. Sou alta. I am LaDonna. I am American. I am a writer. I am tall.
Estar implies a transitory state. Estou bem. Estou com fome. Está um dia bonito. O ceu está azul. A minha filha está na escola. O meu marido está em Espanha. I am good. I am hungry. It’s a beautiful day. The sky is blue. My daughter is at school. My husband is in Spain.
Some things are forever. Some things are ever-changing.
Of course, it’s more nuanced than that. Marriage uses the unchanging ser but is not necessarily a permanent state. Death — which I always assumed to be immutable except in the case of Jesus and zombies — uses the temporary estar like ela está morta — she…
