Conversation, n.: Noise vaguely organized by the aggressive use of avoidance tactics.
Do you know what we don’t do anymore? Give each other time to preface what we’re saying. Which I don’t get at all. I mean I do, but I don’t at the same time.
What I mean by that is the way that we’re always rushing through conversations, whipping past news and quips to get to…what? I’m not sure. I always miss that part. My experience of conversation these days always begins in one of the portals where conversation has always begun. You know, like “hello,” “how are you,” “come here,” “hold your rumin, chimp mullet.” The usual places. Then after that I don’t really remember any conversations. They just blur past me, leaving an impression of passive-aggression and a distinct sensation that I need to apologize for something. I never know what, and I never have time to think about it properly before the next whirlwind of implied accusation rushes around me.
Why can’t we talk to each other again? What happened to conversations? How did we get to this point where we treat every conversation like rushing through somebody else’s Tumblr feed? I’m sure you’re familiar with these moments. When we’ve only got the few seconds while they’re away in the bathroom to gather and forward the blackmail information. When the pressure is on like that, we can’t be fussed by any of the longer and more personal entries and need to hone our focus onto the few bottle rockets of damning memes that we can truly use to discredit all their arguments for the rest of always.
That’s what I use Tumblr for, anyway.
Or…I mean…I heard about somebody who does.
How did conversation turn into that? Into shouting matches to come up with the best punchline, and damn the set-up, and damn the relationships. How did we get to a place where conversation feels like the infinite scroll of social media, blurring over time into the senseless repetition of one never spoken, ever suggested plea for some spark of warmth in a reality devoid of stimulation?
Or am I missing the point entirely? Am I missing the truth which is that conversation has always been like that? And that it’s wrong to vilify the internet as the source of the banality, and instead to uphold it is a instance more of art reflecting reality? Where Tumblr and Instaspam and Twitter — that monstrous bird! — and the godbook are the ultimate demonstrations of how we have always interacted since we learned that there’s more polite ways of flirting than beating each other with blunt instruments. Has it always been normal to speak to each other as if every new thing we say has all the life force and just as much entertainment value as one dead leaf on the sidewalk? Satisfying for a heartbeat, but happily forgotten due to the sure knowledge that there will be millions more. Or was there some other way once?
I don’t know which it is.
I’m confused. I’m always confused these days, but I’m especially confused about this.
It seems to me that one of the points of conversation, most of the time, is to divert us while we wait around for the next…I don’t know, movement of survival. Eating. Procreation. A combination of them. Whatever it is. So I don’t know why we’re in such a hurry all the time.
I feel like I ought to say that I’m sorry I took so long to get to my point.
But I won’t, because I’m not sure I ever had one.
