Can We Talk 2

Raabbit Holes and Side Trails

         I have the bad habit of assuming everyone is as interested as I am in whatever topic I approach. I'm sure I come across as a bore. I know a very smart woman, who speaks in a monotone, and will go off in a direction no one expects, expounding on German history or whatever from 300 years ago. The average person has no idea to what she is referring or how it fits into the current discussion. I am so afraid that I am like her that I sometimes I stop myself after I start talking and say, "Never mind." I excuse myself when I don't stop by remembering I at least have a little inflection in my voice.

         It is so easy to go off into a rabbit hole, particularly when you are leading a discussion or teaching a class. Group discussions will go astray like that. In a class the leader has to rope everyone back in to the subject at hand. Our group minds wander just like our own personal thinking does, I guess.

         When writing, we can just as easily go astray. The writer has control and can take it where she wants, but the story or article might get off the course. With fiction that might work as the story will go in a new direction. I've had that happen. The story is in control, not the writer. Nonfiction requires a steady thinker and staying on topic. My mind wanders too much. I need to stick to very short essays.