Too Many Words

"Too many words, Mr. Dubov, too many words". This was often my Mother's single criticism of my written work, for it is true, as readers of this journal well know, that I use too many words. I run on at length when I would be better to be silent or at the very least not be so damn verbose. The use of too many words is a failing of mine in the spoken realm as well, for I often say too much and certainly somehow manage to say the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time.

Hopefully, I use this journal as a release for the excess verbiage that I seem to spontaneously generate, but this is no excuse for my tendency to speak without thinking or worse, speaking to others as if what I have to say is of any real import to them. For more often than not, my words, if I am lucky, are merely redundant. However, when I am unfortunate enough to be unable to restrain myself once again, my words are, in their bluntness and lack of restraint in their use, hurtful and damaging to the people who hear them. I understand now what Yeats meant when he said he "would be now, could I but have my wish, colder and dumber and deafer than a fish".

It seems that the time for me to stop talking and start writing has come. That way, at least those who choose to read my words know that they can also choose not to, thus freeing them from the foolish and selfishly self-aggrandizing opinions I would otherwise force upon them in the aural world.

For those whom I have harmed with my words over the years, I cannot expect forgiveness, but I can hope for the understanding that they were uttered without precaution and concern for your feelings. For these words, I apologize here and resolve not to continue subjecting you to the torture that I know a conversation with me can seem to be.

Remind me, if you will, when talking with me and you hear the words begin to run wild, that I have made this resolution. Tell me without hesitation that you will no longer tolerate the kind of verbal abuse I've subjected you to in the past and that your expectations for what I say should be tempered first by what I do.