I Was 15 and Madly in Love

I was madly in love, and I was only 15.

People like to say that’s too young. I disagree. I think it was my greatest advantage. I wasn’t too young. In fact, I think I was just old enough.

Old enough to know what I liked. Young enough not to be embarrassed by how much I liked it.

It started with a voice. I can’t fully explain it, but the first time I really heard it, something in me went quiet and paid attention. The way the words seemed to melt into each other. The softness. The way even an ordinary sentence sounded like a secret.

After that, I was gone.

I would replay that voice again and again and again. I’d stop whatever I was doing just to listen. I memorised phrases I didn’t fully understand yet, simply because of the emotion they stirred in me. I practised saying things out loud, alone in my room, trying to sound right. Trying to be understood.

Some days it was frustrating. Some days I felt like I was the only one trying. But I kept showing up, because when you’re in love, you don’t wait to be good at it before you commit.

Eight years later, I’m still madly in love.

With French.

And honestly, how could anyone not fall for it? I loved the attitude, the way every phrase felt like a moment to flip your hair backwards. I loved how much passion even the consonants could carry. I loved the way l’argent rolled out as lar-zhahn, and that the alphabet itself plays tricks on you: G is pronounced zhay and J is zhee. C’est génial, more like zhay-nyal. Ooh la la.

Then there’s ma chérie, “my darling.” It comes from cher, which means dear, and also expensive. Both meanings go back to the same Latin word for something precious and costly. So when a French speaker calls someone ma chérie, they’re basically saying: you are expensive to me. You are worth a lot. Come on! There’s no arguing it. French is the most romantic language.

Wanting vs. obsession

Here’s what that 15-year-old version of me understood without realising it.

Your first language, you didn’t choose. It came to you. You heard it before you could understand it, and you grew into it without trying.

Every language after that is different. Nobody hands it to you. You have to go after it. You have to find something in it that pulls you back again and again: a sound, a culture, a song, a person, a dream. You have to be a little bit obsessed.

Do you want to learn French?

Or are you obsessed with speaking it?

Wanting gets you a downloaded app and a notebook with three pages filled in. Obsession gets you listening to the same clip ten times, talking to yourself in the shower, and grabbing every chance to say something, anything, out loud.

Why we speak first at De Glot

That’s why, at De Glot, we put speaking above everything else.

Grammar matters. Vocabulary matters. But love isn’t something you study from a distance. You fall into it by showing up, finding your voice, stumbling over your words, and trying again anyway. Our live conversations happen three times a week, with learners who are figuring it out alongside you, and there’s always room for you at the table.

What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done to learn a new language as an adult?

And honestly, how far would you go? Would you talk to strangers, sing badly in public, change your phone language and get lost in your own settings?

I was 15 and madly in love. Eight years later, I still am.

Written by: Theodora Eloh
Date written: November 13, 2026