わかりません

Language is a funny thing.  English dates to the 5th Century.  The emergence of modern English took place sometime in the 15th Century.   Little is known of prehistoric Japanese, but substantial texts did not appear until the 8th Century.  It was basically a sibling of Chinese until almost the 13th Century.  So both of these languages have been spoken in some form for more than a thousand years.  

Let's consider cooking over a thousand year period: open fire, stone oven, cast iron stove, electric coil oven, microwave.  Or transportation: walking, rowing, sailing, ocean liner, jet airplane.  Massive developments here.  Why is language something that evolves so incredibly slowly, if at all?  Why do we cling to centuries old spelling and grammar rules that make absolutely no sense?  What's worse, we know they make no sense.  Can you imagine Mercedes-Benz refusing to modify their 1886 automobile?  "Vell, maybe vee just add za horn, ja."  It's absurd.

I've hit a wall in Japanese class.  Or rather, I've become a wall.  The lessons are bouncing off of me like rainwater against glass.  Nothing is seeping in.  I'm not retaining anything anymore (if I ever was).  Slowly I'm falling behind in class.  I'm frustrated and I want to tell someone, the Minister of Language, or some scholarly gatekeeper of Japanese, "This language is impossibly complicated.  Can't you please do something about it?"

Part of me wants to say fuck it, and quit.  I get no joy from these lessons.  In fact, they are a source of stress for me.  But I know, if I stay in Japan, I will be forever outside if I can't speak the language, the lazy expatriate skimming across the surface of the country in which he/she resides.  I want to prove not only to myself that I can do it, that I can learn this impenetrable language, but to the sensei, who I am sure at this point thinks I am hopeless. My name has a distinct inflection of disappointment now when she speaks to me, and the look on her face is one of concerned anguish, "Oh, Robert-san.  How will you ever make it in this world?"

I honestly wonder if I haven't developed some kind of learning disability.  (sigh)