Hear No, See No, Speak No. . .

I don't really feel like writing today. Of course, I haven't "felt" like writing for months. My steady, day-time job is rife with communication of both verbal and written variety. If my phone isn't ringing itself off my desk, email notifications are flying at my face with machine gun rapidity. Ding! Ding! Ding! It's like some hopped up Girl Scout is ringing my doorbell. . .just ringing, ringing. . .pressing that button. "HEY LADY! I KNOW YOU'RE IN THERE? YOU WANT SOME COOKIES? HUH? DING! DING! DING! DING DING DINGGGGG!"

By the end of the day, I've spoken, written, typed, e-mailed, mailed, short-handed (my own version, not the "real" shorthand), sung, begged, pleaded, snapped, yelled, laughed, fake-laughed, EXTRA fake-laughed and nearly cried myself out of or into several different situations. By the time I arrive home, I'm so worn out from all of the communication, that I sink into a deep, self-imposed and mindless silence. 

Of course, part of the problem is that for those eight (or ten, or sometimes twelve) hours of the day, I'm not communicating information that I'm excited about. Honestly. How does one get amped up over building envelope issues or poorly installed window flashing? I can tell you this: It is a rare day that you'll hear any of us crowing about a smoking gun. In commercial construction litigation, any "smoking guns" that turn up are actually kind of exciting, but it's not the subject matter that makes it so. Rather, it's the utter THRILL that comes with finding evidence that YOU (or any member of your team) were RIGHT and that the other party was WRONG; or the satisfaction of finding the one sentence, in one damning e-mail, after reading thousands upon thousands of them, that is evidence of anyone's wrong doing. But it's almost never that clear cut. Too many fingers made the pie, so when systems fail, whose fault is it, exactly? The contractor? The sub-contractor? The produc. . .HEY! HEY! WAKE UP! I'm talking to you!

Anyway, my point is, that by the time I get home, my creative spark is left to weakly glow somewhere in my heart. I can feel it wanting to arc and burst forth in brillance. . .but it's been dampened by the tears of my miserable day. So there it sits.

Add let us not even begin to discuss the ever so cruelly addictive monsters that are Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo. . .blah blah blah. Status updates. Likes, unlikes. Friends. Unfriending. Strange people requesting to be your friend. The agony of wondering if you will hurt the strangers feelings if you choose NOT to be friends with them. The texting. The calling. The sexting. It's just all too much for me. Even now, as I sit here in my warm and toasty (and SILENT) house, my cell-phone is ringing. Do I answer? Do I not? I don't want to, but let me tell you what will happen if I don't:

I will ignore the phone and it will ring until I am angry. Then, when I am about to explode, I will finally answer and snap "HELLO?" where the implication is never just "Hello, you've disturbed me" but more like "WHY IN THE HELL ARE YOU CALLING ME NOW? WHY. RIGHT. NOW." and no one will be there. I will have juuuust missed them.

Of course, I will then look at the screen to see whose call I've missed. And then I will proceed to allow my mind to run wild with catastrophic fantasies of someone being maimed or dead or maimed and dead or dying or worse (is there anything worse? Actually, yes. Yes there is.). Then, without a doubt, I will frantically speed dial the person who just called me and when they answer, I will be there panting "Ohmygod,IrantothephoneI'msosorryIjustmissedyouiseverything(gasp)okay?" And inevitably, the recipient of my call will say "Oh heeeeey! Howzit goin? I was just calling to see what you were doing."

And I will be stuck, for the next twenty minutes, doing exactly what I didn't want to do: communicate.

As I re-read this (quickly. . .you know I don't proof), I understand that starting out the New Year with such a griping, pessimistic rant is probably bad form. But it's what sprang forth today and one of my resolutions was to write, even if I didn't feel like it. Perhaps I'll do better tomorrow. Although I have to be careful when using that word: "tomorrow." After all, my second resolution was to stop procrastinating.

xo