Insanity is always a reasonable diagnosis when you’re dealing with writers and artists. Sometimes the only real difference between crazy people and artists is that artists write down what they imagine seeing. In the past few decades, hardly a week has gone by without a reader of my blog questioning my mental health. I understand that; I’ve read my writing too. The rational part of my brain knows that if enough people suggest I might be crazy, I need to consider the possibility. #5 в контекст | | |
I also have some craziness in my genes. My mother’s father spent some time in the loony bin, or whatever it was called at the time. If I recall, he was the recipient of electroshock treatments. Apparently they didn’t work, because my mother and grandmother later left him forever, taking nothing but the clothes on their backs, as he chased them down the road with a blunt object in his hands and, apparently, homicide on his mind. I couldn’t rule out the possibility that I inherited whatever caused Grandpa to flip out. #6 в контекст | | |
Living as a presumptive crazy person was hard work. When I tried speaking to humans, my vocal cords clenched involuntarily on certain consonants, giving the impression of a very bad cell-phone call that drops every third syllable. Asking for a Diet Coke at a restaurant turned into “… iet oke.” I usually ended up with a sympathetic look and a regular Coke. Or worse, the server would say, “I’m fine. Thanks for asking.” And I would get no beverage at all. #7 в контекст | | |
It was a confounding, maddening problem. I could sing fluently, albeit hideously, which was entirely normal for me. And I could recite memorized pieces without much of a hitch. But I couldn’t produce a normal, intelligible sentence in the context of a conversation. #8 в контекст | | |
Like a stutterer, I learned to avoid problem syllables that would trip me up. If I wanted gum, I knew it would come out as “… um,” so instead I would try a work-around, such as “I want the stuff you chew.” That approach generally failed. People don’t expect riddles in their casual conversations, and no matter how clearly I laid out the clues, all I got in return was a puzzled expression and “Huh?” #9 в контекст | | |
Losing your ability to speak is obviously a social nightmare. It’s so surreal that you feel like a ghost in a crowded room. And I mean that literally; it feels like an actual ghost experience, or at least how you imagine that might be. The loneliness was debilitating. Research shows that loneliness damages the body in much the same way as aging.1, 2 It sure felt that way. Every day felt like losing a fight. #10 в контекст | | |
I learned that loneliness isn’t fixed by listening to other people talk. You can cure your loneliness only by doing the talking yourself and—most important—being heard. For the next three and a half years I experienced a total disconnect from normal life and a profound sense of aloneness, despite the love and support of family and friends. My quality of life was dipping below the point of being worth the effort. #11 в контекст | | |
In the early months of my voice problems I had a more immediate problem than my loneliness. In addition to being a syndicated cartoonist for Dilbert, I was a highly paid professional speaker. And I had an event scheduled in a few weeks, the first since I’d lost my ability to talk. I couldn’t predict whether my voice would work for my canned speech in the same way I could sing or repeat a poem. Would my vocal cords slam shut on stage and stay that way? Would I stand in front of a thousand people and yammer incomprehensibly? #12 в контекст | | |
I informed my client of the situation by e-mail and gave his organization a chance to cancel. They decided to forge ahead and take the risk. I agreed to take the chance too. Luckily for me, I don’t feel embarrassment the way normal people do, which I’ll discuss in an upcoming chapter. The prospect of humiliation in front of a thousand strangers, many of whom would likely be video recording the disaster, wasn’t as much of a showstopper as you might think. It was worth the risk to me because I needed to know what would happen with my voice in that context. I needed to find out the pattern. Would my voice work if I presented a mostly memorized routine in front of a thousand people? There was only one way to find out. #13 в контекст | | |
