Friday, April 22, 2005

Lava Locks and Unlocks

So who’s idea was it? she asked.

My face felt quizzical.

The red, she completed.

Mine, I told her, shifting up my face muscles to bridge the gap. Strange question, but I went with it. She chose the, the person who does my hair, chose the

She turned her head away and continued walking down the hallway.

color, I finished.

My social discomfort in this office should be no secret. Tell your friends, tell your pets. Making up conversation at the copy machine feels phony, and I idealistically aspire to be genuine; therefore, repeated hanging in there thank goodness it’s Friday that’s a long fax yep supposed to rain all weekend hihowareya's feel like flimsy branches off meta-talk tree. I acknowledge my fellow human beings—not to feels unnecessarily cold—but speaking just to speak beyond that eludes me. I don’t know what to say.

You started this conversation, I thought, so why am I being cut off. This happens most frequently here in this corporatesque non-profit box. A fellow employee asks me a question and as I reply that person walks away. Or the fellow begins what I think is to be a conversation, by speaking to me, and when I reply, the walking away. Talking at. They had their say and that was enough for them. Sad, insular, choppy chessboard we hop around on.

Conversation inherently involves "con". See cum in Latin, with, together with. When one concludes, one puts all the pieces together and makes a decision. When one concocts, one puts the selecteds together in the pot to make one soup. In confluence two streams flow to each other, they meet. There is no meeting when one stream is cut off, re-routed back with all its soil bits and pebbles.

Guise. Has always worked mysteriously on me. Guise tricks me into believing a person is something that person is not. Just because a person can conjure the gumption to speak does not mean that person can engage in conversation, which relieves me of every century of fault I've felt in the situations when I felt prompted to say nothing at all. Each person has his weaknesses. I tend rather not only to display mine but to draw red arrows pointing to them. It's the strengths I tend to dress up in gumptive guise.

Color. Not just red, but bright red, lava-confluent, this hair. Sometimes yours is too. Cheers.

7 Comments:

Blogger glomgold said...

Ha! I think about this sort of thing all the time. There used to be a proper ratio of listening to speaking, about 1 to 1 (maybe I'm being a romantic here). I've often resorted to gibberish in midstream to test people, but I can't fathom the "start a conversation then take off" thing.
Thanks for the word-root tip with con. That will help me a lot remembering words like 'concatenate' which I always want to keep in mind but lose it at some point.

12:51 PM  
Blogger Patrick Keilty said...

It seems at times that cordial conversation falls to the wayside in corporatesque, fast-pace environments. There's too much emphasis on a 'quickie' conversation before going back to work. The work place would be friendlier if people listened more. I try to give wordless gestures and signifiers when listening. A short "mm" or nodding of the head will suffice. Some say eye-contact works, but that can also get awkward and weird after too long.

12:40 AM  
Blogger Mr Anigans said...

i've taken to not completing words in conversations...

i'm setting a precedent early.

4:18 PM  
Blogger {illyria} said...

you would be my favorite anti-diplomat.

6:13 AM  
Blogger cupcake said...

The faux conversation is so fucking tiring. After a whole day of fake laugh and fake talk all I want to do is nap.

11:16 AM  
Blogger Sara said...

glomgold--given our minds, you, me and mr anigans, i wonder if i might have grown up in your family. i don't think it's a romantic notion the ratio used to be more even. i noticed less listening, however, when i moved from the midwest to jersey. that also could be coincidence--a conversational culture shift that happened to take place at the same time.

patrick--right. so why do the people who treat me like i'm awkward in conversation not exhibit these things? (sometimes, when feeling feisty, i give penetrating eye contact in order to throw off the speaker.)

mr anigans--i think you're on to something. i think you should mix in shouting on random beats in your speech rhythm.

transience--thanks. do i get business cards, or a t-shirt with big block letters? anti-diplomat. yes.

melissa--maybe spontaneous napping during the faux conversation is a solution.

12:51 PM  
Blogger kim said...

Ifeel like mastery of this non-conversation is the key to getting ahead in the corporate world. I loathe it, and I couldn't fathom saying "Hot enough for ya", "How about dem yankees", or "Working hard or hardly working". However, I feel that if I could master the art of small talk making the "right" connections would be easier...

1:30 PM  

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