Constant talkers. I’m in a

June 29, 2002

Constant talkers. I’m in a ship’s lounge. Trapped in the lair of a constant talker. She’s loud too. Carrying on a relentless litany. Her life story must be told in both past tense and present. Parenting in a style that repeats the names of her children with every address. Surviving without oxygen as there is nary a chance for her to breathe. Its been two hours and it is constantly accelerating. If she were to have a single drink to “loosen up” I fear her mouth would tear itself loose from her cheeks in a horrible garble of blood and soft tissue. Teeth hitting me in the forehead. I’m going to get her a drink just to get it over with. The people all around are picking up books as a method of self defence. Reading anything they can quickly reach. Matchbooks, coasters, doilies, clothing labels...anything. The woman beside me is taking one for the team right now. Looking down at her mystery novel while the constant talker describes the social situation of herself and her husband. The victim hasn’t looked up once and the talker is trying to skin her alive with an attack from the flank. Oblivious to the fact that the lady is trying to ignore because she knows it is impossible to ignore her. Like Chinese water torture the seemingly tiny problem intensifies through repetition.
I have learned that she is an “artist”. I know quite a lot about her training in visual mediums. I would make the supposition that she is probably not a very good “artist” because most of those are brilliant listeners, observers and interpreters. She is, however, “art” itself. She has created herself as a piece of work. A spectacular exaggeration of annoyance. An impressionist painting of it. As the performance art continues you can almost hallucinate that she is a cubist painting. Shards of her verbiage contorting her face into a towering mask of garbage, eyes, nose, pathos and boredom. She’s about 30. Mother of three children named after past soap stars. The children and husband are silent. Not a word. She is doing the work of hundreds. Speaking all the words that need not be spoken. Saving unwanted language from extinction. She articulates everything. Each instant of her actions is documented by a statement. “I’m just going over here to look out the window oh look at the bird Tapestry honey, have you ever seen a bird like that? stop it or you’ll get a bloody nose do you remember that time in Truro when I drove away from the Tim Hortons window because daddy had a bloody nose, oh my GOOODD I would never late a,look at that man’s computer isn’t it cute I wonder what he’s writing my husband keeps a journal its full of all kinds of drawings and writings that are just amazing, he teaches sculpting sciences at the community college of Bilbong on Trunk and he’s an amazing, Brittany put that down you have been told a thousand times that you can’t always OK just this once but don’t come back to me again with any more talk about this, I think I’ll read this book I’ve been waiting to read for ages, geez its going to take me forever to read this but I’m going to read it now, oh geez this is funny, listen to this honey...”.
Somebody buy this art and stuff it away in the attic where it can best be appreciated.