DLand - Talk To Me While I'm Listening

I talk to myself. I have done it all my life. In my room as a little girl. In the car. When I'm out walking the dogs. In the grocery store. In the office when Bossman is not around. Sometimes I get embarrassed. I pretend that I'm singing a song. I kind of bop my head back and forth like it's some rant in a pop music anthology. I speak softly and look around so people won't hear me.

But there is something to be said for voicing what's in your head. To hear the words come out of your mouth. I replay conversations that I've had. I talk to those who aren't there with me. I tell them all the things I've never said and never may.

Sometimes I can just write it all down. I look back on it, digesting the words and moving them around 'til they scratch the itch in my brain. But other times I have to hear them. I have to know what my voice sounds like when I stammer out the words. I have to hear myself suck my teeth in irritation or sigh in anticipation, biting my lip.

This time of year is the best for talking to oneself. My warm breath carries the words out in front of me into the cold and I watch them float over to the person who isn't there - the kind listener who I can't see.

My father told me when he was a child on the farm that they could pick up radio stations from far off cities at night. The air was thinner then and the sound waves could travel farther. I always thought it was because there was less clutter at night in the air and therefore more capacity for sounds that would normally get congested and lost during the day. I imagine that the things I say carry better at night as well. There is more space in the atmosphere for a few thoughts from Genie to float away. Perhaps like radio waves, they continue on forever. They can be heard in far off cities or outer space or even other worlds. Perhaps it only matters that I can hear them.

Hey, it's me. Can you hear me?