Logorrhea between the Sexes

 

logorrhea - noun - tendency to extreme talkativeness (Google)

I don't know about you, but I have often wondered which sex, male or female, has more of a propensity for loquacity. To be absolutely fair, one's final decision could boil down to life experience. For one, I grew up with a garrulous mother given to somewhat mendacious monologues meant to fill up blank space. My father, who played the diffident, doting husband, blindly in love with my mother, forever granted her centerstage and never so much managed an aside to quell her logorrhea. Consequently, I matured thinking that women, not men, are scene stealers when it comes to talking. 

This afternoon, I was outnumbered and my theory, proven wrong. Four married women friends of mine, all extremely erudite, retired high school teachers, and I make up an inappreciable book club that meets once a month to discuss a tome of choice. After we had thoroughly dissected November's selection, George Saunders's Lincoln in the Bardo, and could go no further, the conversation segued into their husbands's shared talent for talkativeness. All complained quite unanimously and vociferously of their spouses' tendencies to go on and on ad infinitum sans respite, leaving them enervated, yet frustrated. One friend, a subtly fierce native Texan, married to an endearing artist from Utah, exclaimed, "I often say, 'Enough, you damn bastard! Just let me get a word in edgewise for a change.'" Indeed, each woman had a similar derogatory directive to impart. As a divorced, single woman, I felt like I had to defend the absent males and countered with, "Well, I am always fascinated with what my therapist boyfriend has to say." Their mutual feeling was that I would soon become tired and bored with his verbal contributions as well. Maybe, but I doubt that since I don't see us ever tying the knot. My friends and more like them are poor salespersons when it comes to advertising wedded bliss as none seem to know what it looks like even though they have been joined at the hip to their men for nearly forty years. 

So, gentlemen, if you are reading this, I beg your pardon if my friends have belittled you personally or your gender in any way. If there is a moral to this story, and there usually is, it is that equal time on the conversational stage seems an equitable solution. Ladies and gents, particularly those of you who are married: Just be aware of how long your monologue is so that it doesn't turn into a soliloquy, performed solo sans an audience. 

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