You don’t have to know me long to realize I’m a loud-talker. Yep. I confess. I’m a bit animated and tend to get a little loud, especially when I’m with my sisters. Together we produce an impressive wall of sound.
Since I have a great deal of self-awareness about my loud-talking tendencies and know how annoying it can be for the people around me, I really try to reign myself in libraries and churches and stuff. But this week I fear my loud talking might be getting out of hand. You see, I’m having a bit of a problem. I went to the doctor’s office the other day to make sure I wasn’t dying of pneumonia and discovered that I have “fluid” in my ear. Totally gross, I know. Apparently there isn’t really anything that can be done about this somewhat painful occurrence and I just have to wait it out. Trouble is I’m a little dizzy and can’t hear very well out of my left ear as a result of my ailment. I’m sure this is a temporary condition so I’m not too worried, but I realized today that my “condition” has to be a bit annoying for the people I live with – especially my husband. (The girls are loud-talkers like their mama, so they probably don’t really notice the difference.)
If I had a buck for every time I’ve said: “Huh? What? I can’t hear you? Can you say that again? Were you talking to me? Huh? Did you say something? What?”- I’d be able to quit my job, buy a house with a wrap-around-porch on Lake Michigan and do nothing but craft to my heart’s content. I’ve even caught myself squinting my eyes in and effort to hear better. Yeah, I know. It’s totally ridiculous.
So I guess this week has been a glimpse into the future for Jeff, my husband of nearly 10 years. Now he knows what to expect when we grow old and gray and I lose the ability to hear out of my left ear and feel like I have to shout every conversation. My word, that man is patient. And funny, too.
Soon after I asked him if I was talking louder than usual he stood before me and moved his lips in silence. Funny right? Well, sort of. Apparently the over-the-counter cold meds I’ve been loading up on increase my already abnormally high level of paranoia because for a split second I thought perhaps my condition had gotten worse. OMG, maybe I do have pneumonia and it’s causing me to go deaf?!
So, it’s been a dizzying, loud-talking sort of day. But I did get some work done and am very pleased to report that I got the Pen Pal Exchange participants partnered up. Finally! The plan is to send out those e-mails tomorrow. It was fun to read about all your creative interests and attempt to make super great pen pal match-ups that will last for years to come.
Hopefully, I didn’t goof anything up and the person I assigned myself to likes loud-talking, apron-wearing craft journalists. And even if she doesn’t, I think I’m okay because we’re exchanging letters not phone numbers and probably won’t ever share the same office. See there’s that paranoia creeping in again.
On the quilt front… I’m still hand stitching the binding and hoping to get it done by Saturday when I will see my studio photographer sister. I hope to have her take a lovely photo so I can show you the finished quilt that I made in collaboration with the mystery quilter I’m featuring in my column this weekend.
My apologies that this post strayed farther than normal from craft and contained gross words like “fluid.” I’m going to blame the cold meds because I can. It will be interesting to see what Google adds pop up next to this post. : )
– JAH
P.S. The “For the Love of Letters” Contest Winners will be announced Monday Wednesday Friday. I apologize for the delay.
