When I wrote fiction on a regular basis, the part I struggled with most was dialogue. Making the conversation between characters feel natural yet calculated was always a challenge. What will they talk about? What do they think, and what do they want to say? How can I imbue each sentence uttered with the weight of a lifetime behind it? How can I make these people and their voices feel real? I have been brainstorming ideas for new short stories and, perhaps prematurely, I am anticipating difficulty in the dialogue department.
My anxiety over dialogue is not entirely restricted to prose. These days, my phone calls with friends and family sustain numerous awkward silences. I dread the possibility of small talk with acquaintances and strangers. It’s not just that we’re suffering trying times and that chaos and grief can render us speechless. I am not, nor have I ever been, a conversationalist.
I admit this not because I am a misanthrope, not because I have nothing to say, and not because I hate speaking to others, but because I am awkward. It may also have something to do with the fact that I am an only child and have spent twenty-eight years in my own head. I find myself at the edges of social settings, listening to others, nodding, processing, trying to be part of the group while saying little. Writing has always offered me an avenue to express myself more fully, to articulate what I’m thinking without the fear of furrowed brows and snap judgments. There is comfort in the flatness of words. The mass of meaning on paper or screen allows me to untangle my thoughts, to connect the dots. Joan Didion can back me up here; she once said (or probably penned), “I don't know what I think until I write it down.”
This holds true with the foreign languages I’ve learned as well. Je peux écrire en français, mais je n’aime pas parler en français parce que je n’ai pas la confiance en mes capacités. When I open my mouth, the words tumble out incoherently. They never seem to fit properly. Yo estoy aprendiendo el español pero muchas veces yo no puedo encontrar palabras para expressarme. Give me a text, a poem, a book, a transcription and I will start to pick it apart, sentence by sentence, syllable by syllable, to get to the bottom of it. Drop me into a conversation and I feel as if I’m constantly struggling to catch up.
Here’s the bottom line though, and what I’ve been coming to terms with: life doesn’t happen on the page. It doesn’t take place in your brain. It doesn’t always give you a chance to regroup or compose your thoughts in writing or pause and come back later with a prepared speech. If you can’t say something in the moment, you may never get the chance to say anything about it again. If you don’t reckon with a situation in real time, you may never find resolution. If you don’t open yourself up to others, you may be left out of the conversation completely.
Many disenfranchised people in this world are not offered the chance to speak up, make their opinion known and let those in power comprehend what they’re living through. Speaking up can make you vulnerable, but sometimes it can just make you feel vulnerable. When you’re given the opportunity, don’t hesitate. Hear yourself speak. When you don’t know what you really think, work through it. Listen to others to help inform your beliefs. Talk it out.
I am actively incorporating this realization into my day-to-day. And when I get back to writing fiction, I’ll apply it there as well. I don’t know who my next narrator or main character will be, but when I find her, I know she’ll have something to say.
Catch up on past installments of interior monologue:
I loved this piece. Besides being well-thought through and then incredibly well-written, it mirrors me some forty years ago. It's scary. And. . . it is you as a young child, standing back away from the fray, assessing the situation first, before committing to a response. It's the sort of thing that will keep you alive longer, and decrease the number of times you have to retract a statement because you spoke too soon. Engage mind before putting mouth in gear.
"Hear yourself speak." Noe, this is everything. Working on being present with my own voice.