A Pink Parrot

I sat on my front porch tonight and told an old friend all about my dreams, desires, and fears.

I did not worry how she received them or how I looked speaking them but focused on the words and how they sounded with truth when they touched my teeth. My voice did not rattle in my ears and I was not in search for the next sentence, but real words offered themselves to me.

I have struggled lately to put into conversation the things I plan to do in the next year. It’s not that desire is not here but I’ve never been a well-rounded conversationalist. I excel in the listening role but when it comes time to speak my voice sounds abnormally loud and the words are not my own.

For quite a while I thought it was other people forcing me to listen, that friends, family, and colleagues did not value the words I had for them. I was wrong.

It was me who was forcing me to listen and it was me calling into question every word that found its way up my throat. It was me who thought my voice sounded too loud and artificial, not them.

I find myself in meetings with wonderful professionals who speak eloquently in perfectly symmetrical circles. I listen and nod with affirming grunts but have no idea what they are saying. Sometimes I even wonder if they know what they are saying.

This way of speaking moves me in no way but I find myself trying to reshape and reuse their statements like a small pink-colored parrot. I spit these words back out to the world but can’t make sense of how they sound in my ears and worry that I missed a few filler words.

At networking meetings, I stare into the blank faces of strangers on my computer screen and try to put professional-sounding words that are not mine to my goals. It works in circles and takes me nowhere. I feel the emptiness in my statements and suddenly there is less air in my lungs.

This did not happen on my porch with my old friend. I had pulled complete ideas from my belly and offered them to her before I even knew what I was doing I did not pass time by counting my breaths in and out but felt heat from a bright blue sky on my chin.

I am not eloquently professional nor a small pink parrot. I am me and am now learning that my front porchway of speaking is absolutely enough.