Man of few words

Almost any person who has met me in person, and most especially those with whom I have felt comfortable about riding my hobbyhorses, will recoil in indignation at applying this 'Man of few words' to me. 'Verbal diarrhea' is probably the first word that springs to their lips if not the more poetic flight of fancy that one of them indulged in - 'Verbal diarrhea verging on verbal Niagara'.

Of course, those who have met me only when in a group are most likely to accept that description, except perhaps saying in surprise - "Few words? You mean he even has a few? I thought he had none." That is because I am rather shy of indulging in equestrian pursuits when in a group, so I very seldom climb aboard any hobbyhorse then.

And, then, to my total surprise, one of those unfortunates, who have been used to seeing me digging my spurs into my hobbyhorse and careening all over the place, called me a man of few words. And then, he qualified. "He is a man of few words and he keeps repeating them. Ad nauseam." I believe that it is a quote of what someone had said of someone else but that was no solace.

The point is, actually, who doesn't repeat himself at all? Only someone who keeps his mouth tightly closed all the time. It is just a question of who you are with, really. I mean, there really are too few people in the world with whom you share a wide range of interests. If you have a friend with whom you share an interest in books but he likes hard metal in music and you are into Carnatic music; he is a foodie and you can keep eating curd rice morning, noon and night and so on...well, what else do you talk to that chap except books? And, after a point, you bloody well will be repeating yourself, won't you, since what you have to say will all have been said, except on the rare occasions when you have a new book to discuss?

I suppose that's the same thing with meeting your school friends in a reunion. There are only so many times you can talk about the time you put the chewing gum in the teacher's chair and the time you hit all three stumps for a six with your reverse sweep...things like that. And, so, you go away and forget all about them till the next reunion where you can...repeat yourself. Unless, of course, you get really INTO what they are doing currently - job and family - so that there are more intersecting areas of interest.

The worst of it is ex-colleagues. I mean, most of your conversation WHILE you were all together would have been bitching about the company, your boss, the HR and office politics. And then you go away to another company. When you meet them after a while you find you have exactly nothing to talk about. You could not care less about THEIR boss, THEIR HR and THEIR office politics, even though you know those people. What's worse is when you start bitching about the boss and you suddenly find that they take offense because that chap had now become their best friend and revered mentor! As for YOUR boss, YOUR HR...well, all they can do is smile indulgently at your theatrics about these small issues and switch the conversation around to the weather. And, if there is anything more repetitive then weather...(I mean, I have never really found why people think it is so profound to say 'Kya garmi hai' in summer and 'Bahut tand hai aaj' in winter in Delhi. But, believe me, if I knocked out those words from all the conversations I had in Delhi, all I'd be left with is sepulchral silence for most of the days.)

These days, though, I find myself rather unhappy. I mean, yeah, it is not the greatest of things to be known as this man of repetitive few words but it was at least a distinguishing feature, something that made me unique. And, now, I find I am reduced to a minor player even in that ability.

I mean, listen to all the discussions of ANYTHING on TV, especially politics. ALL arguments on every side reduce themselves to even fewer words than I have used. Each side has its own limited set of words, the limits being set only by how many synonyms of the same word is known to the concerned parties.

Only goes to show my place in the scheme of things, even in using few words. A bit player, if that! Alas!