A CASUAL INTERROGATION SCENE
My favorite social anxiety is when someone asks how something has been going in my life
“You’re taking a summer class? How’s that going?”
Do you feel that oncoming panic? It feels like being in an interrogation room, and there are two detectives with arms folded, standing over the (weirdly) metal table. The detective playing the “bad cop” demands answers, while the other is the “good cop” detective, warm and welcoming, but that’s only because he, too, wants answers.
I’m sitting at the table, looking up, pleading my innocence. I have nothing to hide; I’m not even sure why I’m being questioned in this case. I honestly believe that if I explain everything I know, I’ll be let go, peaceably. So, I blurt out:
“I’m taking a psycholinguistics class, which is about the study of how the brain interprets written and spoken language.”
The detectives look on, both are professionally unhappy with my answer.
I keep going: “Umm, so there’s a debate about if the brain is modular or not when interpreting spoken language: Are we thinking about a sentence as a whole, or is syntax – what a sentence means – broken down into parts that make the meaning clear? And we do this all the time!”
I’m expecting something, anything positive from the detectives. I’m impressed by my explanation, which is a first. Considering the class, this is an elegant description of something that has taken me 6 weeks to understand.
Except, the bad-cop detective slams his hands on the metal table. “I’m going to give you one last chance to come clean about this. How’s the class going?”
I’m about to crack; I’ve just told them! “We also go over how best to teach kids to read, which the school systems aren’t doing. We should be teaching phonics! Phonics, damn it! That’s all I know! Really! You can read it yourselves, in numerous published studies. It’s a really cool class, I promise!”
The good-cop detective shakes his head with a mirthless sigh; he’s seen enough. He reaches for the door and says to his partner, “I’ll be outside when you’re finished.”
The bad-cop unclasps his sleeve and rolls it neatly up an obnoxiously muscled and tattooed forearm. Across his flesh is something that looks like a starfish. It looks faded, like the bad-cop detective personally pricked the tattoo into his own skin with an inkwell and a sewing needle. “You should know,” he says, “I didn’t want things to come to this.”
The dangling bulb light above the table grows brighter. I feel the cobra-quick grasp of the bad-cop detective’s fingers around my terribly outdated T-shirt. He grins and pulls his fist back…
I brace for four bulging knuckles to splinter my cheekbones on impact.
“Finished!”
I open an eye, unsure of what’s going on. “Finished?”
The good-cop detective opens up the door, ushering his partner outside. The bad-cop detective doesn’t even look at me as he says, “Yeah, we’re finished here. You can go.”
“But,” I plead, “what about my story? Don’t you want to hear the rest of it?”
“Save it,” says the bad-cop detective. “I was bored after the word ‘psycho’.”
“It was psycholinguistics,” I say. “You couldn’t listen through one word?”
“Get this kid out of here,” says the bad-cop detective to the guard outside. “His syntax is bothering me.”
***
WANTED
I’m terrible at telling a story about myself in person.
The scene you’ve just read, more or less, is how every conversation goes in which I’m asked about my personal life. I often see questions as interrogations, as though I’ve been arrested and placed in a room for police questioning. Even worse, it feels like I’m that suspect with nothing significant to add to the case. Which, isn’t a good experience for the suspect, either.
Like any suspect, if you’re put through the trouble of being questioned, one would hope it’s because you had something meaningful to contribute. Why dislodge someone from their day and dismiss what they had to say? Nothing hurts a suspect more than not being found wanted, I find.
But this is how it feels when I’m asked things; it’s the twist ending to the interrogation scene: The detectives leave the suspect behind because he’s BORING them with details that don’t apply to the case.
Even for wanted suspects, this is embarrassing.
***
SOCIAL TIME OUTS
I’ve thought about why I’m terrible at talking about myself out loud. Over the course of this week, here’s what I’ve found:
When someone is asking about how life is going, they want to know how you – as a character – have faced some sort of adversity in the course of what you’re going through.
In other words, they want to know how YOU started to approach something, how YOU were met with an obstacle, how YOU figured out how to get past said obstacle, and, finally, how YOU are different from what happened.
This makes for an enticing story. How do I know this? Because this is the literally the playbook of what makes all stories worth hearing.
Were you ever told a story that didn’t include a character you gave a shit about? Case closed.
The same applies for when saying something about yourself; ultimately, the story is about YOU going through change.
My mistake in answering the question, “How is your summer class going?” was in trying to describe the class. There was no ME in the story. That’s because I didn’t think talking about myself was interesting; the class must be what everyone wanted to know about. So, Instead, I covered the course materials, explained details about theories and modern approaches of psycholinguistics—and exactly NONE of my story had myself as a character going through change.
Can you imagine why faces glazed over with waning interest?
It’s during these times that I wish it was socially acceptable to call a “Time Out” during conversation. If a conversation is going too far off the rails, calling a “time out” to clarify the intention of a question would solve a lot of problems.
Time Out: “Oh, Robert, hey. Umm, I was asking about how you like the class, not what it’s about. That’s interesting, too, whatever psycholinguistics is, but I’m really just asking how you’re feeling about taking a class. Does that make more sense? Ok, start over.”
Or,
Time Out: “When I ask about your day, you don’t have to list everything that happened in a 24-hour period of time. You can just tell me the things that meant something to you, personally. Ok, go on.
And,
Time Out: “Let’s assume when I ask what we should eat that I simply mean what the both of us would eat together, and not something weird that you consume in private and in the shadows of your home. Ok? Let’s try again.
Can you imagine? It would solve so much.
***
CASE SOLVED
I’ve heard that a good mystery story incorporates two things:
- It teaches about a new subject
- Great characters navigate that subject to solve something.
I think this is a great stencil for talking about oneself.
So, if I’ve learned anything from this week, here’s my revised response to the question, “How’s your summer class going?”
“It was one of the hardest classes I’ve ever taken. The thing about summer classes is that they are accelerated, so you get 6 weeks to fit it all in instead of the usual 15. I didn’t think I was going to be able to keep up. Four to eight hours of lectures about psychology, reading studies, two quizzes a week, plus assignments and group discussions on top of that. It was basically a part-time job.
What saved me, I think, was liking the material. I love learning about the mind. Did you know that the reason people struggle to talk about themselves is that human beings are wired for conversation? It’s true. Talking introduces more topics, so there isn’t a chance you’ll run out of something to say. If you’re monologuing, like I am, you run out of things to say. Do you know what the secret to better speaking is? Planning. Just taking your time and planning what you’re going to say.
That was a huge stress relief with the class, honestly. I thought I had to get everything right away, but after I learned that, I slowed down and it was a lot more fun. And by the end of the class, I was enjoying it. I got a 96%. The class average was a 78%. Not sure how I pulled that off, but it was awesome.”
**
Not a great answer, but much better than listing off things about the class, don’t you think? I like the person telling me that story a bit more, and I’d listen a little longer…supposing I get one or two TIME OUTS to change the subject with soon after.
I just finished the class and even I’m ready to move on from psycholinguistics for a while. Yeesh.
Time Out: Ok, you’ve read this far. What I really want to know with all of this is how you tell stories about yourself. Do you talk about things or about how you feel as a character about those things?
***
***
Wishing everyone as well as you can be. You’re not alone out there,
