TheBanyanTree: Once Upon a Time . . .

[Julie Anna Teague]

Quoting "Margaret R. Kramer" <margaretkramer at comcast.net>:

> As I’m getting older, my ears are less patient.  I’m a “get to the point”
> person.  I don’t want to hear the fluff and decorative adjectives and wild
> verbs.  I just want to hear the gist.  Cut off the fat and get to the meat.

Oh I do so know what you mean.  I feel your pain.  I live your pain.  I've been
known to ramble a bit too much when I'm telling a story to friends, and I've
been accused of not getting to the point when I tell a long joke (I'm horrid at
telling long jokes), but on the job, I am all business when it comes to
communication.  Everytime I send an email, or have a phone conversation, I make
a conscious effort to cut to the chase, to be perfectly clear and effective in
as few words as possible.  And I am downright allergic to the reverse.  

I have a weekly meeting with a woman who is one of the most repetitive speakers
I've ever run across.  The same sentence or thought, ad nauseum.  It seems like
she's going for emphasis or effect, but none of us in the room need emphasis. 
We've generally got her meaning the first time.  I know that she is a somewhat
lonely, older woman, and she is a very nice person.  I can muster the patience
for her, most days, because I know that in some ways, she just needs to talk. 
But set me in that meeting on a tough, busy day, and I am nearly exploding with
pent-up impatience.  

I work for yet another woman who cannot complete a sentence, ever.  She
constantly interrupts herself and winds through some circuitous thought path
until I have no idea what she is trying to say.  She is an acronym dropper of
the worst sort.  The difference between her and the first woman, though, is that
I am supposed to be taking in and understanding the complex operational
directives she is handing out.  It is frustrating beyond belief.  I absolutely
can't understand how this woman got into the position she's in with these
communication skills.  I never walk away from a conversation with her feeling
like I fully understand what she was trying to convey.  I can't be the only one
who has this problem.  But since it is a matter of professionalism that I must
understand her, I have hit upon methods to get at least the minimum of
information I need.  Usually, I send an email with one or two concise questions.
 I try to make them yes or no questions as much as possible.  I get an answer,
mostly, sometimes, and then I formulate my next question, until I build up,
slowly, enough information to do my job.  It's tedious.  It's beyond the level
of pet peeve.  

I am also seriously affected by tone of voice.  I found this out during marital
counseling with the ex.  His voice quite literally put me to sleep.  I came to
realize that although I would go into any conversation with him fully alert and
ready to discuss the topic, by five minutes in I would be nodding and yawning
and could barely hold my head up.  It was strange.  It was the sound of his
imperious father-knows-best voice, like the most boring sermon delivered in
monotones on a sleepy, warm Sunday morning in church.  Of course, it's
considered very rude to yawn and nod when someone is trying to say something
important.  Then I realized he wasn't saying anything important, he was almost
always saying something self-important.  I've run into a few other people who
have this preacherly affect on me.  Fortunately no one important to my life at
this time.  

(This reminds me of a running joke we have in our house.  You know those ads for
Lumenesta, the new sleep drug?  And maybe you know that feeling of being in
church, the bodies next to you are slightly warm, the sounds around you are
slightly buzzy and droning?  The minister has become monotonously sonorous--it's
nearly noon.  A baby in the next aisle is sleeping with a bottle of warm milk
slack in her mouth?  Your partner puts his hand on the nape of your neck and
then gently tugs at your hair?  You suddenly recall being a small child and
being able to lie down on your mother's lap during the endless sermon?  At that
moment, you have to fight sleep with everything in you?  Yes?  We decided, if
only one could bottle this exact feeling and uncork it when unable to sleep.  We
call this possible miracle drug: Sermonesta.)   

Ok, I might be getting carried away on this subject, but your post hit a chord,
obviously. 

Back to matters at hand,  

Julie