Caveat: Forthcoming meandering.

A friend lately was telling me how calm I appear. Pretty true, I guess. For the most part I’m a low-stress kinda gal. But it got me thinking about stuff that makes me tense, and I came up with a silly one, which I’ll share with you here.

So, I think audio books are a great idea, and I would love to be able to listen to ‘em. Imagine inhaling your favourite novel through your ears while doing other things with your hands and your eyes! Like… laundry folding. Like chainmail-making. Wow. Think of the possibilities.

But there’s things other than my borderline case of APD getting in my way. I have an impatience problem.

See, I read at somewhere around 700 words a minute. Now, before you say, like (seriously) nearly everyone does, “Oh, yes, but I like to really enjoy what I’m reading.”, I’ll add that this is my average novel-reading speed, computed by the number of words in a novel divided by how long I spent reading it, while wallowing in the tub, dangling in a hammock, or kicking back on my couch. I didn’t hurry along in my reading, skim solely for salient facts on the page, or stop an imaginary timer when I got up to pee or make more tea or kiss my lover or answer the phone or pet my cats, either. It’s just my average, what-a-good-book-this-is-I’m-really-enjoying-it reading speed.

According to Wikipedia, audiobooks sorta average out at 150 words per minute.

Although I love going to author’s readings and like having loved ones read stories to me, a recorded audiobook makes my blood pressure rise as soon… as… the… molasses-slow… introduction… begins. It’s the torturous equivalent of wishing to leave the house to go for a walk, putting on your coat, and standing by the door, and asking your grandfather to tie up your Doc Martens for you. Imagine him slooowly getting out of his rocker. Imagine him finding his walking stick, hobbling over, bending over your boots, and squinting at the mess of laces. Imagine his hands shaking as he picks up one lace loop after another, trying to find the end with the aglet.

Ready to scream, yet? Yeah, me too. I can do it myself faster! I could be already walking through the autumn leaves, breathing the crisp air. I just want to get going on that walk novel.

There, wasn’t that a nice neurosis?

To make it extra ironic… didya know I’ve earned money by reading text aloud? Yes, somewhere out there, my recorded mellifluous tones are pissing off some fast reader.

I co-run a site for leatherdykes, and lately I was checking in on a conversation about a couple’s poly relationship (they lean to different points on the poly/mono continuum, and it causes friction).

I was struck (pun intended) by how similar the positions taken were, to conversations I’ve seen, overheard, and been part of. My gawd! We all have the same brain! Or at least the same catch phrases.

If I were a grrl with more time on her hands, I might (might) be tempted to do a glossary of common polyamory/polyagony phrases, and seek the universal subtext within. What might we learn about ourselves from such a project? (Besides about our own cynicism. I’m aware of mine and I’ve come to terms with it.)

What are some things you’ve heard again and again?

And to clarify:

My post isn’t at all about queer relationship language compared and contrasted to non-queer relationship language — because I think it’s a truism that all human love relationships in this culture sound pretty much exactly the same.

Any conversation between people in a relationship (we’re in love, you’re the best, what about the groceries, honey did you pay the phone bill, who’s spending too much time on the computer, who shall we fuck tonight, what you think about my mother, who you’re dating and what does poly mean to you, I think we’re breaking up, I can’t believe you thought I meant…) has the same language, intonations, baggage and subtext, whether it’s said in two contralto voices, two tenors, or a mixture of the above.

What I’m looking for is… a look into *why* we (the humans, or even just the poly humans) have the same conversations with each other, saying the same things that people have been saying for as long as there have been people. And why don’t we have any analysis about it?

Is it the human condition to start a fight about buying candleholders when the root of that person’s distress is “I’m scared you’ll feel romantic with someone not-me, and that’ll mean *I’m* somehow not worthy of romance or love!”? Why do we talk in relationships about veto and the intimacy value of a sleepover, and whether it should be allowed, and the rules (control) around beginning dating a third, and the micro-management of sheet sets and sex toys and special coffee mugs and “our restaurant”… when so much of that conversation boils down to a metaphorical “I’m scared when you drive your life around without me as the sole focus. Hand me your steering wheel, I need more control.”

And here’s the kicker question — why is the root feeling so often vociferously denied? It begins the cycle anew. “Look, I’m not jealous, but…..”

I think I think too much.

-Elaine

That was a fun post title to write.

I’m writing this thing, see? And I gotta find someone who’s much better at family law than I am, so when I write the part of the protagonist (who fictionally does family law and criminal law), I don’t sound stoopd and ill-researched.

Are YOU a lawyer? Is your cousin? Are you a law STUDENT? Did you used to be law student?

If so, please to be chatting with me. I will trade all sorts of things, from eternal fame, to yummy baking.

elaine (at) elainemiller (dot) com

Like half of North America, I’m reading bits and pieces about the Virginia Tech massacre. But that’s not what I want to talk about.

I’m in a wordy mood. My word of the day is “brandish”. The student who killed all those people was seen, in his own video, “brandishing pistols”.

Here’s what Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary says:

Main Entry: brandish
Pronunciation: ‘bran-dish
Function: transitive verb
Etymology: Middle English braundisshen, from Anglo-French brandiss-, stem of brandir, from brant, braund sword, of Germanic origin; akin to Old English brand
1 : to shake or wave (as a weapon) menacingly
2 : to exhibit in an ostentatious or aggressive manner

So, we have a word linked to a particular class of nouns. When we use it in another fashion, such as speaking of a bride brandishing her bouquet, we’re parodying the bridal desperation, by likening the bouquet to a weapon. (So that’s why I dodge ‘em at weddings.)

Metaphorically speaking, pens are oft likened to swords. Here’s my question. If I’m angry enough, can I brandish a blog post?

Dear You People;

Why do the makers of handsoap and facesoap and squooshysoap create a product that smells like the fucking perfumed wedges of paper that drop like bombs out of womens’ magazines?

Why make and sell something that makes your hands reek of odd foreign substances for hours after you wash them? Most of us wash our hands so we can get ‘em clean — not get ‘em stinky.

I mean, if the purpose is to both create bubbles and an overpowering scent in order to mask some scent that’s already there, why not just market the reeky stuff as Old Man’s Ass Cleaner or some appropriate variation?

Damn.

-Elaine