Chewing the rag is a drag: death to ‘small talk’
WATER COOLER CONVERSATION SHOULD BE COMMITTED TO THE FLAMES. As Aristotle would write, “Fools speak when they have to say something; wise men speak when they have something to say.” One writer decries hokum, recommending instead, as Paul McCartney sings, that we “discuss all the vast intricacies of life,” “speculate about the cosmic solution” and get “caught up in a philosophical discussion.” Graphic Courtesy of Wikimedia commons
Dear Reader,
I ask you what your current opinion is of today’s weather? Oh, have you not been pondering this topic more than a millisecond a day? I beg to ask why our society is plagued by this question. Never once have I taken interest in thine own opinion of the weather.
Death to small talk. Every conversation I speak returns filled with un-exuberant remarks, as I ask what recent events you have partaken and you reply with SCHOOL! I go to your school, I go to your classes, I know you have been to school, I know you have homework and I know you have to study. If I ask about your day and don’t receive a play-by-play from the moment you wake up to each passing event till this very instant, then I have no clue what you have done today.
Death to small talk. A boring, banausic banter occurs in a benign manner where you beckon to me my favorite food and in return I ask you if you have seen any good movies as of late. Between each deplorable question we ask, lies an awkward pause in time that splits atoms as if centuries have passed us in an anxious dance, almost as if no person knows whose line is next in the script. It is this quietness that seems to scream, leaving lamented, tormented anguish within my skull that my own neurons would rather burst in a blaze than reluctantly continue this courteous tango of tolerance that occurs with small talk. Death to small talk.
Welcome to Big Talk! We can indulge in an articulate, adverse manner about philosophical ideas and ideals. Let us spin a web of words in discussion, deploring the meaning of life. Let’s ask each other what ethical problems and dilemmas we can fabricate, whether altruism is tangible or imitation. Ask me for any of my surreal, somber thoughts that so scarily scrape your skull; you are beckoning for an answer that will not be received in small talk.
Death to small talk. Big Talk creates a court of craved, creative, contemporary chatter that continues contributing to the comprehensive craft that is our own dialogue. Words that flow through technique and talent that terrify the tenebrous, temporal masses to talk about ideas only your ninth grade English teacher can find bold and interesting: that’s Big Talk.
Yet to most this idea is terrifying, so we retreat to small talk. But small talk doesn’t have to be boring talk. Many experience a mundane conversation with most people, but instead I invite ideas of wonder, intrigue and whimsy. Ideas that are spoken without any hesitation of judgment or fear from others. Tell me your love for the flowers and the poets and don’t stop till you have nothing else to say. Describe to me your music as if you could paint it. Be not afraid to ramble or tell me your opinions no matter how much I disagree. I invite conversation that can flow subject to subject without pause as constant as rivers flow. Banter that makes seconds become hours as time becomes irrelevant to our web of words made of yarn and string rather than thread and silk.
Small talk does not need death but instead revitalization. Death to small talk.
Sincerely while seriously silly,
THE RENO VALENTINO