Speak With Me: English Speaking Practice

Vanessa: "So how did you  

meet?" If I asked this to you, would you know  what I was really asking? Well, never fear. In  

today's lesson, I'm going to help you answer  this question and talk about love in English. 

Hi, I'm Vanessa from speakenglishwithvanessa.com,  and today you're going to have a chance to  

speak with me and practice your  English-speaking skills. Yes. 

The topic of romantic love is a common one in  daily conversations so I'd like to help you learn  

some common questions about love, some common  phrases and expressions we use to talk about love.  

And then you'll see a sample conversation  between my husband Dan and I about love,  

and then it will be your turn to practice speaking  in English out loud with me about this wonderful  

topic of love. Are you ready to get started? Well, before we do, I have something special  

for you. I'd like to invite you to download the  free PDF worksheet for this lesson with all of the  

important questions, phrases, sample sentences,  and a chance for you to write down your sample  

conversation with me and practice it out loud as  many times as you need to. The goal is for you  

to boost your confidence so that you can go out  into the real world and talk about this daily life  

topic with confidence. That's the goal, right?  To have confidence. So I recommend downloading  

the free PDF worksheet. There is a link in  the description that you can use. Just click  

on the link and the free PDF worksheet is yours. Let's get started by talking about some common  

questions that someone might ask about love. If you are walking down the street with your  

boyfriend, someone might ask you,  "How long have you been together?"  

This means how long have you been dating? Or they might ask, "How did you meet?" This  

is the question that I asked you at the  beginning of this lesson, and it's not  

"Where are you meeting right now?" Like, "Oh,  I'm just walking down the street." No, they're  

asking where was the first place that you ever  met each other? And you might say, "Oh, we met  

at school," or "We met at a bar late night when I  was dressed up like a turtle for Halloween." There  

might be a fun story to go along with that. Another fun question is, "Where was your  

first date?" This means the location of  your first date. So you might say, "Oh,  

our first date was just to a restaurant."  Quite simple and a common thing to do. 

I like this one. "How did you know that he was  the one? Or how did you know that she was the  

one?" This means that this person is the most  important person for you. You will either get  

married or you already are married, or you're just  going to stay together for life. They are the one.  

"How did you know that he was the one?" Well,  there's a lot of things you might say to this,  

but a common expression that you might  use in response is, "Well, when you know,  

you know. It's this feeling you have inside  of you. Well, when you know, you know." 

Another fun question about love is, "Do you  believe in love at first sight?" So if you  

go on a date and your friend asks you,  "How was your date?" You might ask this,  

"Do you believe in love at first sight because  I think I'm in love," and you've only been on  

one date, well, that is love at first sight. And your friend might say in response to you,  

understandably, "Is it true love?" This means  a real deep enduring love, not just something  

simple or puppy love, like we'll talk about in  just a minute. "Is it true love?" Great question. 

And hopefully not after the first date, but at  some point your friend might ask you, "Well,  

when's the wedding?" And they might be asking you  this as kind of a little joke. Maybe you're not  

engaged yet, you haven't actually said that you're  going to get married to that special person,  

but your friend might be kind of hinting, "When's  the wedding?" Or "What's going to happen in the  

future? Tell me about your relationship." All right. Let's go on to some common  

phrases that we use to talk about love. The first category of expressions are types  

of romantic love. We're going to talk about  the most shallow leading to the most serious. 

The first most shallow one is an expression that I  just used and that's puppy love. Sometimes we use  

this to talk about children or young people  when they have their first love interest.  

This is a crush. When they have their first  crush, we might say, "Oh, young puppy love." 

And the next word is the one I just used, a  crush. Sometimes we use this to talk about  

someone we know in real life, but you can also  use this to talk about a celebrity, for example.  

So we might say, "When I was younger, I had a  crush on Johnny Depp, the actor." Obviously,  

it was something unrealistic, but it just  was something that was in my heart, a crush. 

And as we amp up the feelings, we might say,  "It wasn't love at first sight, but over time,  

I fell in love with him." Love at first  sight. Have you ever experienced this? 

If you have, you might use the next expression,  which is head over heels. You could say, "I fell  

head over heels in love with him right away." Wow,  that's a very intense experience. And this just  

means you can't keep your balance because your  love is so strong, you don't know what's going on.  

You're just in this whirlwind of love and emotion.  You fell head over heels in love with him. 

And once you move beyond puppy love, falling  head over heels, you might say, "Now it is  

true love. Our love is true love. It's not just  puppy love." You can make a comparison. It's  

not something fleeting and simple and shallow.  Instead, what we have is true love. So romantic. 

And when you feel true love, it is getting  serious. So serious is sometimes a word that  

we don't really associate with positivity and  something like love. But this is a common phrase  

that we use to talk about a relationship that  might lead to a long-term relationship, either a  

marriage or a lifelong commitment. So your friend  might ask you, "Oh, are you getting serious?" And  

they're asking about the enduring quality of your  romantic relationship. "Is this something that's  

going to last? You've been on three, four dates  already. Is this getting serious?" Or maybe it's  

something that's not serious and you might say,  "Hm, no. We're not getting serious," or "I think  

we're getting serious. He might be the one." Our next category of expressions to talk  

about love are words to describe  romantic love, and then we'll talk  

about some verbs to describe romantic love. The first one is a fun one, sappy or cheesy.  

Personally, I use cheesy all the time. Let me give  you a little example from one of my high school  

relationships. And when I say relationships,  I mean romantic relationships. You could say,  

"My boyfriend and I wrote long letters to  each other every day. It was so cheesy,  

but you know what? I loved it." You can get the  sense here that it's something that's overly  

sentimental. Maybe it kind of makes you feel  like, "Oh, that's a little strange. Or maybe  

that's a little too much." But you know what?  When you're in love, it's something that it's  

not a big deal. It's cheesy, but it's true. The next one's a fun one, lovey-dovey,  

lovey-dovey, and usually this has to  do with a public display of affection,  

sometimes we call this PDA. So if a couple is  always holding hands and snuggling in public  

and kissing each other, we might say, "Wow, they  are very lovey-dovey." But the opposite could be  

true as well. You might say, "We're not very  lovey-dovey in public, but I still really care  

for him." And that's just kind of personal  preference, kind of a cultural thing, too. 

Next, I want to tell you some pet names that  we often use in the US to talk about our  

romantic partner or to address our romantic  partner. So instead of saying their name,  

you might call them or you might say  this about them. You might say, Babe,  

"Hey babe." You might say, Honey, Hun, this is my  preferred expression. I'll tell you a silly story  

about it in just a minute. You might say, also,  Sweetheart, Sweetie, Love or Dear. "Hey, dear." 

So I want to tell you, I often call Dan, my  husband, Hun, but apparently I rarely say just  

Hun. Instead, I often say, "Hey, Hun," because  I'm giving him some kind of direction or calling  

to him. So I might say, "Hey, Hun. Where are you?"  So one time I called into my yard, I said, "Hey,  

Hun, where are you?" And my child, my son, went  into the yard to look for him and he came back  

and said, "I don't know where Hey, Hun is. "So  he had heard me say, Hey, Hun, so much that he  

thought this was one expression that I used  to address Dan. Just a silly little anecdote. 

And you can really use any of these, but I do  want to give you a quick little cultural note  

that in the US if a stranger says Sweetheart  or Dear, it's kind of rude. It's almost like  

they're trying to make fun of you. So let me give  you a little example. Let's imagine that a woman,  

usually this is referring to a woman. Let's  imagine that a woman is going to the gas station  

and she's about to put gas into her car, but she  does something wrong. Let's say that she pushes  

the wrong button and she uses the wrong handle.  Someone who is at the other guest pump might  

look over and say, "Hey, Sweetheart, that's not  how you do it." Well, it's not really something  

correct that she's doing and that guy added the  word Sweetheart, kind of to imply "That's a kind  

of stupid thing to do that you're doing," wasn't  a very polite expression. But if you're using this  

with someone you love, it's not a problem. Now, this is very different from in the UK.  

Expressions like Love or Dear or Sweetheart are  used by strangers in a positive way. I remember  

many times in England getting on the bus and the  bus driver saying, "Come on, Love. Get on the bus,  

Love." And I thought, "Oh, that's so kind. It's  so sweet." The way he said it was so endearing  

and you could tell it was said with a kind of  kindness. So this is a cultural difference in the  

US compared to in the UK. But if you're saying it  to someone you love, don't worry. It's all right. 

And finally, before we get to our conversation  practice, let's talk about three verbs that  

we use to talk about love. The first one is a  lovely little insect, to give you butterflies  

in your stomach. Have you ever been in love and  you just have this feeling inside of you that's  

hard to describe? It kind of makes you feel maybe  a little bit nervous, a little bit excited, all  

at the same time. You might say, "When I first saw  him, I just had butterflies in my stomach." We can  

imagine a butterfly fluttering in your stomach and  it kind of describes that feeling of discomfort,  

but excitement at the same time. I want to know,  is there an expression that's similar to this in  

your language? I know that some languages  use other animals, other insects, and have  

really colorful ways of describing that feeling of  excited, but nervous love. So let me know in the  

comments what that expression is in your language. Have you ever heard this in a fairytale, to live  

happily ever after? And this kind of implies that  there are never any difficulties or problems.  

It's kind of an overly sentimental phrase. So we  might use it in real life like this. "I thought  

that getting married meant that we would live  happily ever after. But the reality is that  

marriage is a lot of hard work." So here we're  comparing this fairytale idea that everything is  

always just wonderful and roses and rainbows and  happy. And the reality that having a long-term  

relationship with someone is a lot of work. So  we can use this in kind of a realistic way, too. 

And our final phrase, our final verb to talk about  love is this one, to grow old together. This is a  

very romantic phrase. So we might say, "My husband  Dan and I met when we were very young, but we look  

forward to growing old together." And this implies  we hope that we will be together forever until we  

are old and we will live through all of life  together. We are going to grow old together.  

This is a phrase that you might hear in someone's  wedding vows. As they get married they might say,  

"I look forward to growing old with you,"  because it's a very sentimental thing to say. 

All right. Are you ready for our conversation  section? Let's take all of the questions,  

all of these key common phrases and add them up  together in a conversation. You're about to watch  

a sample conversation between my husband, Dan and  I, talking about our long-term relationship. Guess  

how many years we have been together. You'll  find out in the conversation in just a minute. 

And then after that conversation it will be  your chance to speak. I'm going to be speaking  

with you, asking you some questions, and you  need to speak out loud and practice with me.  

But before we do that, I want you to watch the  sample conversation and get ready. Let's watch. 

Hey, Hun, I have a question for you.  Do you believe in love at first sight?

Dan: Ooh,  

good question. I don't know if everyone  does, but I sure do. It happened to me.

Vanessa: Oh, really?

Dan: With you.

Vanessa: Oh.

Dan: I had butterflies  

in my stomach the first time you talked to  me, and I knew it was more than puppy love.

Vanessa: Oh,  

that's so sweet. How did  you know that I was the one?

Dan: It sounds cheesy, but when you know, you know.

Vanessa: Oh, that's so sweet.

Dan: What about  

you? Do you think we'll live happily ever after?

Vanessa: I sure hope  

so. We've known each other for 19  years, so it's starting to get serious.

Dan: I'd say so.

Vanessa: Well, here's to growing old together. 

All right. So now you know the answer. We have  known each other for 19 years. Incredible. 

Well, now it is your turn. I want you to practice  speaking out loud. This will help you to retain  

and remember everything that you've learned from  this lesson. I'm going to be asking you a question  

and then I'm going to be quiet. I'm going to pause  while you speak out loud. You can repeat this  

section as many times as you need to kind of gain  and grow that confidence in a safe area until you  

go out into the real world and talk about love. All right. Are you ready to get started?  

Let's do it. So I want to hear  

about your romantic partner, your partner or your  spouse. Tell me, how long have you been together? 

Oh. Well, tell me what was your first date. Thanks for sharing. 

Now I want to know, do you  think that they're the one? 

Oh, that's so sweet. Thank you for sharing with  me. I love hearing other people's love stories.  

I hope that you live happily ever after. Well, congratulations on growing your  

English-speaking skills. Feel free to go back  and review that conversation as many times as  

you need to. And a great way to do that is  by downloading the free PDF worksheets. This  

includes all of the common questions, all of the  common phrases, definitions, sample sentences,  

and the sample conversation, plus a chance for  you to review and write out your answers to these  

questions. My goal for you is to be able to take  this conversation skill and go into the real world  

to use it. So make sure you download the free  PDF worksheet. You can click on the link in the  

description to download that free PDF today. Well, thank you so much for learning English  

with me, and I'll see you again next Friday for  a new lesson here on my YouTube channel. Bye.

Dan: What about  

you? Do you think we'll live happily ever after?

Vanessa: Well, what am I supposed to say? Well ...

Dan: Well, we're done for.

Vanessa: We have to start over, I can't do that. 

But wait, do you want more? I recommend  watching this video next where you will  

talk about your weekend plans. This  is another common conversation topic.  

What if you went on a date? What  if you didn't go on a date? Well,  

you can learn how to talk about it in  this conversation and I'll see you there.