Proverbs 10, Verse 19
"Don't talk so much. You keep putting your foot in your mouth. Be sensible and turn off the flow!"
---
CHIPPED WISDOM:
You can't follow me on Twitter.
Sorry. I know that's a pretty crushing blow. I shouldn't have just come out and said it right like that. I should have at least kissed you and felt you up first.
It's hard to imagine that I, one who lustily seeks out opportunities to climb on top of a soapbox and energetically ride it for eight seconds would eschew one more audience-driven venue.
But I have. I have eschewed it. It hath been eschewed. A Jew'd.
A-choo.
Maybe it's because I don't understand it. I'm at that age now, you know, where I don't understand things that people who are younger than me do, apparently, understand. I don't understand why new cars have to have infotainment touchscreens. That bothers me, and I am perhaps a little too proud that the dashboard of my 2006 CR-V is about as spartan as a cheap plywood end-table. Cars have enough computers under their hoods-- I don't want one in my fucking face while I'm trying to drive, and I certainly don't want them in the fucking faces of the other fuckfaces who are trying to drive next to, in front of, in back of, or potentially head-on into me. I want their fucked faces looking at the road, and their little fuck fingers curled around their steering wheels, not selecting "Pour it Up" by Rihanna or watching a cat play Double Dutch with a vole on YouTube on a screen in their car. Driving's hard enough, and people are dumb enough without that shit. Okay, now I'm done sounding like Andy Rooney's more profane step-brother.
Of all the advice I've ever been given (don't watch fucking YouTube while you're driving notwithstanding) I've never been told "Don't talk so much". No, people seem to like it when I talk, though I'm not always the best judge of their sincerity. I have been told, on numerous occasions, far too frequently to count, "Don't think so much".
Thinking too much gets you into far more trouble, I've found, than talking too much.
Of course, here's the conundrummy little paradoxical quagmire: people only know you're thinking too much if you're talking about what you're thinking. Too much. About.
(Whoa, right? And I don't even smoke pot!)
I have this bad habit: when people ask me what I'm thinking about, I generally tell them. And that's not so good. Because, really, people don't actually want to know. It's taken me a long time to realize this, and it still doesn't stop me. Nothing does. Not even not having Twitter or an in-dash infotainment center.
I will earnestly launch into some rant or other if you'll sit and even half-listen to me. I will tell you about my fears and my anxieties and my terror and my memories and I will T.M.I. you like you've never been T.M.I.'d before because I'm pretty sure that I don't have anything to lose by having you get a little closer to me. I don't mind it. In fact, I maybe kinda need it. I was never one to keep people at a distance. I don't know how to be private or closed off. It's not in my nature. I put on this show of how I just want to surrender and dig a hole and hide forever from the world, but force me to go to a party or a social gathering (watch your glasses and your pretty little nose, because I will kick) I light up, in spite of myself. The rambling jokes, the awkwardness, the energy all comes out in a dizzying spectacle of self-deprecating humor, imitations, bizarre references and sardonic put downs and come ons.
Because I need to see you smile. I need to hear you laugh. Rarely, depending on certain factors, I may need to look down your blouse. Hey, I'm not perfect. But this is what it is. Call it whatever you want: an audience, a friend, a partner-- I need it. And whether it's through talking, thinking, writing, acting, creating-- it's all ways to reach out. Because it's desperate over here. At least, I think it is. But maybe I just think too much.
That's what this is, of course. It's me talking too much. Always too much. It's too much, Goddamnit, so why don't you make me stop?
Right.
Go ahead.
Make me.
Putt'em up.
I dare you.
(Sissy.)
Sometimes I wish I could be content just... being. Quiet. Yeah-- with being quiet. And I go through a lot of my day being quiet, at least, I think I do. I'm terrified of saying "the wrong thing" or "the ugly thing" or "the terrible thing" or "the unforgivable therefore you're fired thing". But I'm never afraid of saying the embarrassing thing. I don't know why-- I'm apparently horrified of being embarrassed, of committing some social sin where everybody points at me and laughs, or, worse, is moderately afraid of me. I tell people that the first thing you have to get over as an actor is the fear that you're going to look foolish, because you are. But that's bullshit, the first thing you have to get over as an actor is you. And maybe I'm just not over me yet.
I'm definitely over 140 characters. And I like that.
No comments:
Post a Comment