Almost 45 years ago, when I was a social work graduate student at UC Berkeley, I took a year of Spanish, along with my usual classes on community mental health, psychopathology, family and the law. Why not? I was there on campus anyway, and there weren’t so many hoops to jump through back then. I had a massive crush on the teacher, who regaled us with stories of his rum-soaked nights in various Caribbean countries. I took the class with my then-boyfriend’s mother, and remember her saying in class, “Soy muy cariñosa.” (“I am very loving/affectionate.”) This was not my boyfriend’s experience of his mother, but I was not going to get into it, especially in a foreign language.

Since then, I have used my very broken Spanish to communicate with the lovely women who clean our house. Their even more broken English and our elaborate gesticulations have served us well. But as things started ramping up with Trump’s terror campaign against immigrants, I wanted to resurrect my Spanish skills from the pile of rusty flakes they’d become in case I was ever called upon to use my Legal Observer training to actually help my fellow brown-skinned community members.

I was also trying to do what us older folks are supposed to do, which is to stay engaged and learn new things. This seemed even more important as my political dread and anxiety deepened my depression. To counter this, I’d tried my hand at watercolor through community ed, but each class escalated my dread and despair more than the daily headlines I was trying to distract myself from.

When the next community ed schedule emerged, a conversational Spanish class caught my eye. It was only six sessions long, met during dinnertime, and cost about three times what a regular semester-long community college class cost. I didn’t think I’d get much out of it besides hunger and the hassle of night-time driving, but at least it had nothing to do with art! Then I got the brilliant idea of trying something that was more of a commitment, and instead enrolled in a regular semester-long section of Spanish 101 that met twice a week.

It’s been the best thing I’ve done all year (besides becoming a grandmother). The teacher is warm, fun, and encouraging, and moves us along at a brisk pace. Except for the students from bilingual families, most of us sound like garbage disposals grinding down rocks as we try to converse in Spanish, but our teacher is adept at creating a safe and bonding experience. There are a few other gray-haired people in the class, but mostly it’s a diverse group of young people. We range in age from 16-77, from all different walks of life. I sit in the front row so I can see the board, along with three other gray-haired ladies, but a lovely 20-year-old woman from Uganda sits with us, and we’re all diligent about our homework and group exercises. “So you like hanging out with the old ladies?” I ask her. Yes, she does—she misses her elders back home, and wonders about our American culture’s lack of reverence for the aged.

I’m learning Spanish—“iEstudio español!” I told my housecleaners. “Oh, your Spanish is so good!” they exclaimed. At least I think that’s what they said. By the time I speak well enough to be of any use to our immigrant community, it will either be illegal to learn Spanish or we’ll be through this nightmarish time, but I’m loving the process.

As it turns out, the actual grammar and vocabulary, listening and speaking—you know, learning Spanish—is the easy part. I used to be good at languages, and I have a certain amount of muscle memory from 45 years ago. The real challenges have been:

• Figuring out how to get onto the College of Marin site and register in the first place
• Figuring out how to log onto campus wi-fi for all my devices
• Figuring out Canvas, the learning platform we use as well as COM’s webmail and the virtual textbook
• Figuring out how to do a Google Slideshow so I can submit my many homework projects on famous Latinos, “My Family,” a tour of our campus.

But the biggest and most hilarious challenge is when we’re supposed to identify pop-culture figures and say what they do and where they’re from. Bad Bunny, Selena Gomez, Beyónce. I know exactly none of them by face, and others I’ve never even heard of. My one triumph was being the only person in the class who recognized Michael Jordan, of Black Panther fame. When in small groups we had to show an image of a famous person for others to identify, I was mystified by my groupmates’ choices. On the other hand, no one had the slightest idea who my pick was–Virginia Woolf, of course!

Life-long learning—what a gas, as long as it doesn’t involve picking up a paintbrush or night-time driving. Plus, I spend so much time in class and doing homework that my time to fret about the state of the country has diminished. But being around my younger, diverse, smart, and caring classmates gives me a lot of hope for the future.