Now, this might seem like an odd thing to do, especially since there was no one by that name around, nor even a mouse that we might have named Brian. I had been thinking about my active jobs, specifically a book I'd started editing the day before. Late in the day I'd shot an e-mail off to Brian, the editor, who responded lackadaisically with an answer and tacked on: "Hold off; the author is making more changes to the book."
This is job is piece work, meaning I'm not getting paid for time, just a flat fee. I'd already gone through the front matter and the first chapter. Now I was going to have to go through those again, with no extra money, because the author might have made changes to those sections. And clearly Brian hadn't thought to alert me until I sent him an unrelated question.
The point is, a random onlooker could be excused in thinking I have some kind of disorder, because I do this stuff all the time. I'll be looking for the cumin in the spice cabinet and suddenly blurt, "Skynet knew the Terminator was going to twentieth-century America -- why did it give him an Austrian accent?" That's because the conversation in my head has just reached an inflection point, and I felt obliged to voice my end out loud. Is this normal?
In some cases I can get away with it, thanks to modern technology. If it's a gorgeous day and I'm driving alone with the windows open and I'm at a light and yell "Clemens should have been thrown out of the game!" and the person in the car next to me notices, he or she could suppose I'm having a conversation (albeit an angry one) with someone on the cell phone, maybe through the dashboard Bluetooth hookup. If I still had the shaggy hair I sported in college, someone could think I was on the phone wearing earbuds when I mumble "That was a ridiculous lie about the vaccines" while walking along, but I haven't got the hair for that style anymore.
Maybe I'm just alone too much. I can't remember which comedian said it some years ago, but he or she suggested that crazy people should be made to walk in pairs so that they would look like they were having a conversation with each other rather than the voices in their heads.
Of course, I can walk our big pup Tralfaz, and people could think I was talking to him. That might seem more sane. Unless they're wondering why I'm asking him what the hell he was thinking when he called Rhoda Werner* a gorilla butt in third grade, in which case I think it would be probably seem less sane.
Now I'm at the point where I'm wondering whether it's worse to look crazy or to be crazy and struggle not to look crazy. Yike!
😵😜😖
*Names changed to protect myself.
There's an interrupter in the circuit between the brain and mouth. It's like a spring-loaded switch that keeps it open unless effort is exerted to hold it closed. With usage, the spring weakens and the effort required to complete the circuit diminishes. With extended use, it can start flopping around, closing the circuit randomly. When this happens, whatever is going through the brain gets expressed orally.
ReplyDeleteSee, I'm not crazy; it's just a mechanical issue, of sorts.
(I don't think I said this out loud ....)
Sounds like one of the problems that can be solved with duct tape, raf!
ReplyDeleteFor a while, I would occasionally mutter "bah, humbug!" under my breath, when the mood struck me.
ReplyDeleteOne day, I was with a co-worker in an office, we were both just working away, when I heard him mutter "bah, humbug!" to himself.
I had to stop doing it, I couldn't knowingly share that quirk. So now, it's "pish posh".