Have you ever heard the one about the girl that answered an innocuous question with a truthful answer with some actual verbiage beyond yes or no? Well she answered the question with some detail only to have the questioner either have the "eye glaze of boredom" occur, or even better walk away without a backward glance. Maybe they didn't understand that they are supposed to wait for the response and then further interact with said answerer, you know like a...
conversation:
con-ver-sa-tion noun, a talk, especially an informal one, especially between two or more people in which news and ideas are exchanged.
Why do we feel the need to only listen as a chore, not even as a courtesy anymore but to get through the niceties in order to reply with our own ish or move on to something better? When did we lose our ability to communicate face to face? We don't listen to hear. We are all hit with so much information, instantaneously, from every direction all day long, and it's presented in such an entertaining way that plain old boring communicating through speech just can't possibly measure up. Hurry up and finish yammering already so I can read this Instagram Post or watch this Facebook video of some stranger's cat pawing stuff off a countertop...I mean it must be important right, as two and a half million other people also watched it. Besides, I see you all the time! I can find out how you are doing any time, after all there's a ton of commercials during the tv shows I watch that I can message you...oh no I actually stream my tv as I can't be bothered to watch the commercials so that won't work. Ummm I will text you, hey now there's some good communication there eh? I have snapchat I can snap you some photos with text it, will be just like we are sitting next to each other looking at a photo album. Except it's not, it's not anything like sitting next to someone looking through the dog eared pages of a photo album. It's lonely to be a human these days. We have social media where we keep all our friends, like the paper dolls or green army men in a cardboard box we used to play with as children, remaining suspended there, in the atmosphere of our internet til we log on and see them again. Some of those friendships have actually proven to be some of the closest, most honest, and rewarding. But what about our neighbors? The people in our zip code? Our reality is turning virtual. Another friend recently mentioned that she was experiencing the same phenomenon so we decided that perhaps we should manufacture and market flash cards for adults. Here a few of our sample cards: "Stop talking please, I'm bored" "I'm sorry, I have already forgotten your name" "I don't really like you" "I am not a fan of talking, can we text" "Don't take it personally, I just don't like chit chat". It's a funny concept but it does feel like they might come in handy sometimes. Used to be, we would all converse within our day with everyone we met along the way. Now I go to The "Ractor Rupply" and the very pleasant young man at the register, just happens to have his apple earbuds in during my and other customer's transaction, and I wonder, how is this a thing? How is it acceptable to be a casher while your ear-holes are covered up and you are listening to new Post Malone(hey-yo Posty...maybe) helloooo can you hear me? Truthfully he was quite pleasant...but was he present? Are we present? Do we really want to listen to some heifer drone on and on about "things are pretty cool, working on some new art pieces thanks for asking, and how have you been?" Apparently not by the empty space where you were just standing in front of me. Have you noticed that cell phone plans no longer make their money on the "talk" portion of your plan, only data...in fact on our plan there is no charge for talk. Does that mean not only talk is cheap, but is it altogether worthless? Here's a challenge, from 6pm to bedtime, count your words, count your families words...I think you'll be very surprised to see the results.
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