Talk Talk Talkers & Rio Games

Zits says it again—lots of headings, too few details.

We went out for breakfast this morning and had the misfortune of sitting near a table of four people, one of whom talked incessantly to the other three, not even slowing down when his food was delivered. I couldn’t figure it out. How could he be eating without missing a word-beat? I could hear him telling, or more likely retelling, various dramatic episodes in his life, the words pouring out of him like water in a rushing, mountain stream. I’m always amazed by people who don’t seem to know how they’re dominating conversation. Don’t they ever listen to themselves? Haven’t they ever been told to shut their traps and let someone else speak? Maybe they have but they just don’t care. My oldest brother was like that. I think he may have inherited this gift-of-gab from our father. I wasn’t as close to my father as my brother was, I being so much younger than he, so I’m only guessing that our father was also a talker. All the writing I do might be considered by some as just a silent verbosity. But no one has to read what I say, whereas a talker holds his listener with a verbal straightjacket. I imagine him backing his listener into a corner and then leaning on his arms, one on each wall with the poor prisoner locked there by arms and words. We’re living in an age of too many talkers and too few listeners. In politics, Donald Trump best exemplifies this, a man who talks and talks and says almost nothing. In the coming debates with Hillary, by the rules of the debate, he’ll have to let her speak even though he won’t be listening, too busy organizing the empty words he’ll use in rebuttal.

The opening ceremonies of the Rio Olympics was technologically impressive and visually gorgeous, getting the Games started without a hitch of terror or protest. Now we can only hope the rest of the Games does the same. During the parade of teams into the stadium, I was struck by the number of attractive contestants—handsome men, beautiful women. And all were smiling. It’s hard to believe there are terrorists who would like to kill them, to kill these happy, handsome people. Every four years we hope that the shared competition of people from all over the globe will put an end to national animosity. Maybe this time will do it.