I've occasionally had people tell me that I have a very distinct way of communicating. I've got a "style," if you will. Now, I pretty much only know one way to talk: the way I talk. It's not like I have put countless of hours into crafting a new persona or figuring out how to piece words together. For better or for worse, it's an innate style.
Most of the time, I don't really think about it. It's one of those curious little facts that people have thrown my way and I have retained (sort of like how I know that Japanese has a word for "someone who is so good they are legendary"). However, it's recently come up in enough ways that it's led to a few laughs, and several at my expense.
First of all, it turns out that I write very much like I talk. I've never really thought about it, but that makes some sense. It's pretty natural to try to translate your actual speech into written speech, I think. Either way, this came up when I pointed the Mild Girlfriend to a recent blog post, and she immediately remarked, "wow, I can hear your writing voice loud and clear." So yeah, reading these posts gives you a pretty good indication of how I sound in real life.
What's more, my actual voice, the one that results from vibrations of my vocal cords, is also somewhat distinct. I discovered this the other day when I called in to a meeting. There were two people leading the meeting, but I'd only met one of them. I've seen the other guy's name before, but I don't think I've ever been formally introduced to the guy. Still, I piped up to make a comment, and they immediately identified me by name. Yup, they recognized my voice.
This came as a bit of a shock, and I started to wonder if that was a good thing. After all, it's much harder to make smart aleck comments if people know who you are just by the sound of your voice. Can you imagine how that would go? I'd try to mumble some commentary about the material, and the person would tell me to shut up without even turning around. It'd be like that elementary school teacher who had eyes in the back of her head. You don't want to mess with that teacher. And now everyone had effectively been turned into that teacher. Not good.
Still, the nail on the coffin came a couple of weeks later at the second in this series of meetings. It was the same set of folks, and a few of my friends happened to be on the call, as well. This time around, I had a question about something they had just presented. It didn't sound right to me, so I wanted to make sure I didn't just misunderstand. As my friend would later confess, her internal monologue at the time went something like this:
Friend: "Hm, I'm hungry. I'm going to eat something while I listen to this"
Friend: "Oh, a question"
Friend: "Hm, that sounds like something Sam would ask/challenge ..."
(she looks up at the screen to see who is speaking)
Friend: "Haha, it was Sam ..."
This one is even worse. She wasn't looking, she wasn't paying attention, she didn't recognize my voice, but the content itself gave me away. There's pretty much no hiding from that. Even if I picked up one of those spy gadget things that change the way your voice sounded, I'd still give myself away simply by the things I ask about.
I'm pretty much screwed, there's no way I can hide. People can pick out my voice in my writing, over the phone, and even in my diction. Clearly, this won't do. I may have to start taking ventriloquist lessons or develop a completely new writing style at some point.
Most of the time, I don't really think about it. It's one of those curious little facts that people have thrown my way and I have retained (sort of like how I know that Japanese has a word for "someone who is so good they are legendary"). However, it's recently come up in enough ways that it's led to a few laughs, and several at my expense.
First of all, it turns out that I write very much like I talk. I've never really thought about it, but that makes some sense. It's pretty natural to try to translate your actual speech into written speech, I think. Either way, this came up when I pointed the Mild Girlfriend to a recent blog post, and she immediately remarked, "wow, I can hear your writing voice loud and clear." So yeah, reading these posts gives you a pretty good indication of how I sound in real life.
What's more, my actual voice, the one that results from vibrations of my vocal cords, is also somewhat distinct. I discovered this the other day when I called in to a meeting. There were two people leading the meeting, but I'd only met one of them. I've seen the other guy's name before, but I don't think I've ever been formally introduced to the guy. Still, I piped up to make a comment, and they immediately identified me by name. Yup, they recognized my voice.
This came as a bit of a shock, and I started to wonder if that was a good thing. After all, it's much harder to make smart aleck comments if people know who you are just by the sound of your voice. Can you imagine how that would go? I'd try to mumble some commentary about the material, and the person would tell me to shut up without even turning around. It'd be like that elementary school teacher who had eyes in the back of her head. You don't want to mess with that teacher. And now everyone had effectively been turned into that teacher. Not good.
Still, the nail on the coffin came a couple of weeks later at the second in this series of meetings. It was the same set of folks, and a few of my friends happened to be on the call, as well. This time around, I had a question about something they had just presented. It didn't sound right to me, so I wanted to make sure I didn't just misunderstand. As my friend would later confess, her internal monologue at the time went something like this:
Friend: "Hm, I'm hungry. I'm going to eat something while I listen to this"
Friend: "Oh, a question"
Friend: "Hm, that sounds like something Sam would ask/challenge ..."
(she looks up at the screen to see who is speaking)
Friend: "Haha, it was Sam ..."
This one is even worse. She wasn't looking, she wasn't paying attention, she didn't recognize my voice, but the content itself gave me away. There's pretty much no hiding from that. Even if I picked up one of those spy gadget things that change the way your voice sounded, I'd still give myself away simply by the things I ask about.
I'm pretty much screwed, there's no way I can hide. People can pick out my voice in my writing, over the phone, and even in my diction. Clearly, this won't do. I may have to start taking ventriloquist lessons or develop a completely new writing style at some point.
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