I’d always suspected I was wordy, but never more so than after I had a kid. The Rock tried to tell me, colleagues tried to tell me, my family tried to tell me, but it’s the innocence of a child that finally got through to my wordy brain.
But first: some background. Anytime The Rock and I argue, I go on and on about how he hurt my feelings. I say essentially the same thing — over and over and over — often rearranging a word or substituting some analogy in the next re-telling (“When you didn’t unload the dishwasher, I felt like a baby bear cub abandoned by its mother in the Alaskan tundra because she had to go in search of food that’s been scarce lately due to climatic change and then guess what? I detach from the icy mainland on a floe and am swept out to sea and ultimately consumed by a grey whale. Or a tsunami. No wait. The feeling was more like I was a tadpole left to die and rot at the edges of a bog. Hold up. I didn’t feel like an animal or amphibian at all. I felt like a person who is undergoing heart surgery and the anesthesia doesn’t take and I’m awake and silently screaming while my heart is ripped out by its pulpy ventricles.”) Even better (and The Rock loves this), I write a letter detailing my analogies in greater and weirder length until he has no choice but to give up and say he’s sorry or we’d be up all night discussing my “feelings.”
So it’s like that. Also, I take 1,000 words to say something that could be said in one sentence. Case in point: Do you remember when I was maybe asked out? Well I wrote the guy an email telling him “thanks, but I’m married,” but instead of saying that, I wrote this:
Hi
I hope you’re doing well.
You know, after I got your card this morning, I couldn’t wait another second to tell you (well, first of all thanks) and also: I’m married.
I’m so sorry I didn’t say something right away. Our conversation a few weeks ago got away from me and before I knew it, we were talking about exercise and etc., etc.
I should have said something then, but I wasn’t sure that you were asking non-platonically, and maybe you’re still not, but I thought I should tell you.
I hate the people who assume they’re being asked out when they’re not and I am perhaps one of those people right now…but it’s probably better that I assume so and you know up front?
Take care!
Seriously. This is word for interminably long word.
My point is that Toots doesn’t put up with this crap. Not for one minute. If I go on and on about something, she just tells me to shut it. Like this morning:
Toots: Mom? Why can’t I watch violent shows?
Me: Because I don’t want those pictures to be in your head. {{Then, thinking that’s not a good enough answer}} Because it’s important that you know the world is ultimately a good place. There will be time enough to find out about the bad stuff later. {{Then, thinking now I’ve opened a can of worms and that answer sucks}} Because you’re a kid and violent shows are for adults. {{Knowing that answer REALLY sucks}} Because you’re too young to process and interpret the violent images that you see and until you can do that, I don’t want you watching violent shows. It’s important for you to view violent images in the proper context or —
Toots, interrupting: Mom?
{{Then, not unkindly}}: Can you please stop talking now?
So right. I know she meant well, but that really made me feel like an abandoned tadpole.
i am so much more in love with you now. a tadpole! ha!
but i once got my computer fixed for free pretty much because the hp guy thought i might never stop talking to him if he didn’t.
God in heaven! I just spit Diet Pepsi all over my desk.
Don’t feel bad, my son does that to me all the time. Our conversations usually end with him saying, “Geez, mom! Can’t you just say no and be done with it?”
I feel like an abandoned tadpole. Ha!
I actually read “tadpole left to die and rot at the edges of a BLOG”!!
Funnily enough, I do leave tadpoles out to die at the edge of my blog.
I hate dead tadpoles on the toilet seat though. Makes me feel sick.
honestly, this made me LO fucking L.
my 5yr old (boy) toots tells me that a lot! “Can you please stop talking now?” AWESOME.
while i am not so wordy with the use of analogies and big words, i do the same thing when answering a question from a 5yr old such as the violence on TV thing. it’s SO HARD to try and position an answer that will make sense to them!
i love you and your wordy self!
The exact same thing has happened to me. Many times.
This is me. Seriously. This is so me. Plus, the words that aren’t spilling out of my mouth are swirling around in my head and it’s a wonder I can function some moments. My plan was to cap this comment with ‘This is me,’ but you can see what I mean, right? Seriously.
My kids will be telling me this, I’m sure. Hubby already does. I have a lot of words! :) I want to make sure and get my point across. Is that SO BAD? heehee
And once again, I realize we are the same damned person.
Instead of telling me to stop talking, though, my daughter recently said, “Why is that I can hear every word you say but in my head I see pictures of bananas doing ballet?”
Yeah. I need to just shut up sometimes.
Funny how we bloggin moms find this a common complaint of our children…My son frequently resorts to “OKAY OKAY, MOM! I GET IT.”
I am simultaneously insulted & chagrined.
Agh.
Good luck :D
my husband and I BOTH talk too much when it comes to disagreements…however, my ADD allows me to lose interest and move on- he does not suffer the same fate.
Once a few years ago, he was just hammering his point home and I sighed and said, ‘Can you please stop talking?’
He asked why and I said, ‘I’m just so sick of your voice.’
Stunned, he has never let me forget it :)
My kids just get that glazed over expression and change the subject when I start winding up. Sigh.
In an attempt to limit my word use; I say ditto. Haha.
My kids tell me to stop talking all the time. In fact, my kindergartener just described me as “talkative” and “bossy.” He is 100% accurate.
I loved how you switched analogies midstream! Laughing, here.
I’m a talker, oh Lord. I talk and then I try to end a conversation b/c I just know the person on the other end of the line is going to do just that and I can’t take the rejection. ;)
I’m the same way . . . blah blah blah.
This kind of Q & A with your kids is one of the very best uses for “Because I said so.”