I Took A Beating

Once upon a time, a girlfriend of mine was getting frustrated with my communication skills. She kept on giving me the impression that I wasn't telling her everything and that I was censoring my thoughts when we spoke. It might have something to do with the fact that I'm not the most... vocally fluid person when socializing in person. I tend to take an extra beat to sort out what I think in my head, and another half-beat to compose how I can put it into words before my mouth opens and sound comes out.

She had been reading this here blog for a while, I think, and one day told me that she wished we could just "talk like you write." What a strange statement to make. I don't know how exactly she intended it, but it landed like a bit of a slap to the face.

I think the undertones to what she said were alluding to her frustrations that I didn't speak to her as eloquently as I do here, and that I wouldn't tell her some things I'd write about.

Both those things are, of course, totally correct. I totally resent what she said, though, because what I do here is not a conversation. If she wants to talk like how I write, then she doesn't understand how I type and retype sentences until I figure out where they want to take me. And make no mistake, I often have zero idea where they'll lead me - a written entry here usually starts off as a notion, and I beat it to death which each word until a semi-formed thought emerges. It's a long, drawn out process. She wanted to talk like I write? Well, then she should've been willing to wait in total silence for an hour or two while I fumble my way through expressing a complete thought.

Yeah, maybe the final product looks intentional and palatable, but the act of forming it is anything but. Goddamn, what an obnoxious, clueless thing to say, especially for someone who considered themselves to be a 'creative'. I should have replied by saying, "Yeah, and I wish we could talk like you draw."

Ugh.

Okay, take a step back, and breaaaaathe.

That little remark of her's has stuck with me, occasionally zipping around my skull like that stupid fly you swore you swatted into oblivion five times over. And yet it buzzes. I'm hoping that writing it down here will let me lay it to rest once and all.

I really resented that comment. I think it highlighted a couple problems, one of which was her assumption that I was withholding what I thought and felt. And yet I really, honestly was not.

Her words really got inside my head and make me doubt myself and feel like I was terrible at communicating and just plainly wanted to avoid talking to her. The really scary thing was how long it had taken me to understand I wasn't doing anything wrong, and how she was, just maybe, projecting something else onto me.

The exact words were, "do i EVER wish we could talk like you write."

What a fucking insult. For the record, this short little piece of writing has taken me 1.25hrs to compose, I've reordered seven paragraphs, split three in half, deleted two others, and started, retyped, and removed countless sentences. The real kicker? I know there are some goddamn grammatical errors lurking in there somewhere.

There always are.
-Cril

Now tell me why we never respected each other
And tell me why I never believed that you were a person too
I always thought that you fancied my brother
I may not have liked it, oh but memory is a strange thing, oh, and Enid? 
Enid I remember you

Enid we never really knew each other anyway
Enid we never really knew each other anyway
Maybe we always saw right through each other anyway
But Enid we never really knew each other anyway

Barenaked Ladies - Enid