The Making of a Pharisee

I can’t say I noticed when the great unraveling begun.  Honestly, I didn’t even realize that anything was unraveling at all! If you’d asked me, I would still vehemently claim that the sole reason why I was on Duolingo was because I loved learning languages and I wanted to talk to Margaret.

Then, one day  I almost forgot to clock in.  It was only by the grace of God that I remembered just in time before the day expired.  I was determined never to allow such a slip-up to happen again.

That’s when I set up my Duolingo alarm.

At 20:15 each night, it would go off as if the house was on fire.Sometimes I was in the middle of doing something, and even though I appreciated the reminder, I didn’t really appreciate it.

Mom, have you done your Duolingo today?

Hon, it’s your Duolingo alarm!

Now I had support of my entire family. They cheered me on, genuinely impressed  that I was still sticking with it.  They checked my streak and the number of lingots accumulated in my account.  They even picked up some Spanish themselves without even trying! I can't say I liked that very much.

I still continued to clock in, but somehow most days it felt more like a chore.

Then I found a loophole.

I discovered that if I just re-did my old lessons, it  would count towards my daily quota. Now, I could still keep my streak  if not alive at least on life support, with hardly any engagement of the mind, not to mention the heart.  

Nobody knew about it, so I thought it must be O.K.

My earnest desire to  learn to speak to Margaret in her own heart language faded into the background.

Totally oblivious to what was really happening, I found myself deep in the swampy regions of  Duolingo religion.

My joy was gone, but through gritted teeth I was determined to keep adding to the mindless streak.

Without knowing, I’ve become a Duolingo Pharisee.