Firstly, I should apologise for the title. This is not a manual, a how-to guide or a lesson in the art of conversation. It is no more or less than my own personal observations that have, over the past 26 days of drunkenness, been highlighted and refined into something approaching a personal code by which I myself will endeavour to remember and live by.
Despite my breathtaking literary wizardry, I am not, nor have ever been, a professional writer. One day, when my personality and style has solidified to the extant that I might write a decent novel instead of the eight unedited manuscripts that clutter my desk, perhaps, but for now I am, would you believe a watch salesman – THE HARE is a project that I hope will catapult my name (pseudo as it is) to the attention of a sympathetic journalist who would be willing to take me under his or her wing. And contrary to vicious rumours designed with the sole intention of making me out to be some rough-necked Del Boy, I am yet to purchase a coat capable of concealing my many fairly-priced timepieces. Such an article would not sit well with my usually fastidious array, but may yet prove good for business. I ply my trade working for a well-known Swiss Watch brand whom I shouldn’t name for fear of bringing the company’s good reputation into question when the world realises that Switzerland’s most innovative horological institute would stoop to employing a chancer of my calibre.
It has been said in the past that I am a charmer; a silver-tongued fiend; and occasionally, and quite to my amusement, a bounder. All such assessments of my character have stemmed from the way I talk. I make the classic schmaltz of eighties Hollywood productions look Shakespearian in its execution. I smile a lot – too much, I think. I read body language and adjust my own accordingly. I am a snake, but, and I should say this now before you think ill of me, I am harmless; a toothless adder with no poisonous gland to his arsenal. I am not a playboy or a conman; I simply love to talk to people. I am also fortunate enough to be on the delivering end of a voice which, judging by various recordings I have heard, resembles a fog horn in its monotonic drone.
I read once that the human brain has three distinct sections of vocabulary. In layman’s terms they call them the reading, the writing and the speaking vocabularies. Simply put, there are a portion of words squirreled away in your brain that you can identify and understand when reading a text, a portion that you can produce yourself when given time when, for example, writing at your own pace, and an easily accessible portion that you use to speak and delineate your intentions to another. These sections decrease in size from former to latter. For example, you might see the word ostensibly in a book and know from previous experience what it means, but when talking to someone, you’d likely use a more common synonym like apparently. This isn’t to say that one sounds better than the other, it’s just the maintenance of such elevated lexical choice is necessary to pull off what would otherwise sound like the repetition of a word or phase not your own.
What I have noticed is that the difference between my vocabulary sets is less than might be considered normal. This leads me sound like anything from an erudite lecturer to a jumped up little prick who has enough pretension to lay claim the foundation of the ‘Emo’ fad. What you are reading now is effectively a stream of consciousness. If I was talking to you about this same subject, it would sound almost exactly the same as it reads. I always thought that talking in such a way makes me sound like a bit of a twat – and it probably does – but last week, while out with a close female friend of mine who talks in a less flowery manner, she commented that my style of fast-pace babbling was one of the reasons why she enjoyed talking to me.
“It’s interesting,” she said after a bottle of wine. “I never know what you’re gonna come out with next. We could talk about the same thing all night and it would sound different.”
I mumbled something throwaway in that sort of false humility that rather than dissuade a flurry of compliments from ensuing, subtly (though bloody obviously) encourages the kind words to continue.
“It’s because you can express yourself. You know how you feel and you describe it better than most people. You might sound like a fairy most of the time, but it’s entertaining at least.”
I was ecstatic with this assessment. Fairy or not, I was at least interesting to some degree, and not the complete tit that I had assumed many took me for.
But the real foundations of my current verbal dexterity are knowledge and practice. Never does a day go by when I don’t try to talk at length about something I have just learnt or experienced. Without an in depth analysis of everything I go through, I would be unable to recollect the relevant information at a late date, thus wasting the experience.
I am also obsessed with knowledge. Without knowledge the hope of entertaining conversation is lessened. Sure, there are plenty of fun and interesting discussions to be had on the analysis of feelings and thoughts on certain philosophical and political matters, but without reference points; without back-up or the awareness of what has gone before, the topic will eventually run dry. Opinion is engaging, but without foundation it is trite and wears thin quickly. But I have plenty of flaws. I am still young – only 24 as I write this article – and I still have all the potential and pretension of men my age. I am a wide-eyed idealist and I’m sure this shows through in the way I talk. I am naïve, but aware of it. I relish my inexperience and seek out those who might be able to make me better at what I enjoy doing. I’ve received many a clip round the ear for youthful impertinence, but just as many impressed nods when my ramblings strike a chord with the older and wiser men whom I seek to impress and emulate.
My boss the other day offered me a piece of advice that resonated:
“You know a lot about watches – more than anyone I’ve ever worked with, but the customers…well, they don’t always need to know what you know or that you know so much.”
“So I should…cut it back a bit?”
“You need to be selective. You see the opportunities to break off at a tangent too easily, and once you get going you find it hard to stop.”
“So I should say less…less is more.”
“Relevance is everything.”
And she was right. Knowing loads is great, but releasing that knowledge into conversation at the right time is a skill I am yet to master. I have my good days and my bad, but I am trying to get better; to become more interesting, more considerate – a better listener.
That is the crux of it all: listen, digest and spin. The aim is to perpetuate enthusiasm and keep things fresh. The less you talk, the more power you have in conversation: you can guide the discourse; you can shape your ideas and comments around the topic rather than inundate your dance-partner with unnecessary information. Hold back, be selective, be creative and smile, damn it. If you ever find yourself saying something cheesy, the only way to carry it off is with gusto: power through your own ridiculousness with a self-assured bent that would put the most misguided politician to shame. It’ll work, and if it doesn’t, come and talk to me about it.
Pick up THE HARE newspaper at Night and Day; Bar Centro; or Tiger Lounge in Manchester town centre, or the Oakwood in Glossop.
E-mail theharenewspaper@hotmail.co.uk with questions, comments or contributory pieces.
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