Words

When did I come to believe that my words become dangerous? Someone asked me that tonight after watching me struggle to say good things that seem frozen in my mind. I feel mute. So I am vomiting every message that I can think of that I ever got about my words.

When I was little, my sisters talked for me. People would ask what my name was and before I could answer they would say, “ Her name is Katy” “How old are you?” people would ask and they would say, ‘”She is 4 .”

In 1st grade when I started school, I talked all the time and I would get bad marks on my report card saying I talked too much in school. My parents thought the teacher did not know who I was. Eventually I got a spanking in school for talking. The rule at our house was if you got a spanking at school, you got one at home. So if I told the truth, I got into trouble. So not telling felt safer. It has always felt huge to me that I lied to them but what choice did they give me.

I remember feeling really brave when I was about 13 and smarting off to my dad. I kept pushing him with my words. I remember sitting at the dinner table. The tension is rising and my sister are squirming, wishing I would shut up. He told me to stop being a smart aleck and I said back, “Well I may be smart, but my name is not Aleck” I thought he would kill me. I don’t remember him touching me but he was so mad. I was sure he would explode or have stroke or something.

I was talking on the phone once with my cousin and she asked if we were coming over there that day and I said, “Yeah maybe.” I did not mean anything. We got together with my dad’s family a lot on the weekends. Well she must have said something to her mom, who is my dad’s sisters. He hated this sister and she must have said something to him. Probably something rude. They cannot talk to each other without an explosion. He chewed me out for promising to go over there which is ridiculous. Not like he ever listened to what we wanted to do anyway. But we did go over there and I was somehow at fault.

I love words. I love English and I love journalism. In high school I was editor of the school newspaper. I loved the edginess of saying things that were true but nobody wanted to hear . Asking hard questions, criticizing the system. One time the cheerleaders at a football game did a cheer that my dad felt was racist. Basically they were mocking stereotypical black dialect. He was griping about it and I told him he should write a letter to the editor (which was me) So he did. I loved him for it. It felt like he got me for once. I got all kinds of grief about it at school but I was secretly proud of him for rocking the boat. The newspaper staff did not get into trouble for that but we got into plenty of trouble with the Principal. We were constantly told to not print something and that if we did he would shut down our department. I loved my teacher. Mama Marge, we called her. She encouraged me to study journalism at the school she thought was great. I wanted to be a journalist and change the world with my words. That idea got shelved to do lack of money so I became an accounting major at the local college. And I hated it. And I quit.

I am a word nerd. I like to look in a thesaurus. I like grammar rules and spelling correctly. I had to look up smart aleck just to make sure i spelled it right because it would drive me crazy for it to be seen as a mistake.

If having too many words gets you into trouble, then not having any makes you invisible. I can be invisible. Literally, I have stood in line and have the person behind me waited on first. Mike has seen this happen more than once. Once I was in a cell phone store. There was nobody in the store but me and 3 of my kids. The 2 employees were talking behind the counter and I was waiting. This went on and on and they were not doing work. They were just talking. I waited and waited and finally after about 10 minutes I butted in and asked if they could help me. Amazingly enough, one of them says to me, “Oh I thought somebody else had helped you.” There was nobody else in the store.

When I got married, my mom’s best friend made the cake. I asked for lemon cake because I love it and she said no because too many people don’t like flavors. Ok. So much for bridezilla. The day of the wedding, I am astonished to see the cake is cherry flavored which I hate and yet I cannot say anything because she did this as a favor to my mom.

As an adult, I distrust women who talk a lot. They feel too big and wear me out. They intimidate me.

I have just learned to shut up. It is easier. My husband loves to talk so I let him. Sometimes he talks on top of me, answering questions for me and I feel invisible again. Sometimes it feels easy when he talks for me.

My messages - don't talk, choose your words carefully, don't speak the truth, don't ask for what you want, my words are unnecessary, shut up and be a good girl, use precise words