The gossip queens (and kings) of this world crouch outside closed doors, ears pressed to the wood (or to the bottom of the paper cup they are using as a hearing aid), holding their breath while they attempt, with varying degrees of success, to hear words intended for other ears.

I’d like to believe that most of us are above this behavior.

But none of us can claim that when particularly juicy words happen to hit our ears, we don’t pause and swivel our sound saucers – just so – to find out where the story heads.

Ad-free entertainment.

As a child, a good friend of mine lived on a hill with a driveway that happened to be situated just perfectly to receive phone interference from one specific but unidentified neighbor. Sometimes when we gabbed endlessly on our cordless landline telephones (as 10 year old girls are wont to do), we would suddenly gain a third voice on the line, passionately regaling the highly dramatic unfolding of her life. We would sit rapt for a few minutes – my friend pausing mid-stride in whatever location had caught the signal – to catch up on her latest exploits and continue the maturation of our virgin ears.

When I visited, we would look suspiciously at all the neighbors in her cul de sac, wondering which of them might be this mystery woman. We never did learn.

Rookie mistake: forgetting about the microphones.

I used to work in a law office. I, along with my boss and the associate attorney, went to trial shortly before I left the firm. The opposing attorney we were up against was a very successful lawyer. He was also an old, mean and creepy man. In other words, he was a walking attorney stereotype. We won, but they appealed and, after I left, my coworker had to continue poring over documents from trial to prepare for the next phase of the case.

(I suppose it’s also relevant to note that I have red hair. Though there’s no way of saying that without ruining the punchline.)

One April 3 I received an email from my old coworker. I was sure it was a belated April Fool’s joke, but was afterward assured otherwise. Said email is reproduced below – only names have been changed to protect the (not so) innocent:

I just came across the following whispered conversation from trial:

Old Man: Do you think [opposing counsel] brought that redhead to the courtroom just to distract me?

Old Man’s Second Chair: He doesn’t know—else she would be wearing a nurse’s outfit.

Old Man: Even without the nurse’s outfit, I can manage to superimpose her on [inaudible]. The worst mistake in my entire life was that I confessed to my current wife my fetish over redheads. It goes way past infatuation. Total fetish.

I still revel in the thought of the judge reviewing transcripts from trial and coming across this gem… Priceless.

Everyone enjoys the occasional audible tablescrap – meant for someone else but accidentally slipped to us thanks to carelessness, indiscretion or uncooperative technology. Nonetheless, under normal circumstances, it is the hallmark of a well-adjusted adult to not worry too terribly much what others think of their overheard conversation.

Still…

Tables turn: the parent is embarrassed by the child.

One day I went shopping with my mother. I was fairly new to reading at the time, and I viewed it as a magical power that allowed me to know things about the world to which I had previously been blind. It was my mission to soak up as much knowledge as possible which, at my height, was limited to knowledge placed around four feet high and lower.

Mom!

What?

::Pointing to a box of garbage bags with a “cinch” feature::

I thought that said CHINK!!!!

::Mom is silent::

Hahahahahah! I thought it said CHINK! Isn’t that funny!

Shhhhh.

But it says cinch. I thought it said CHINK though! That’s so weird. CHINK. Funny sounding word, right?

Be quiet.

What’s wrong? I though it said CHINK! Isn’t that silly?

I’m sure this went on for some time before she was forced to yank me to the side and explain very quietly in my ear that “chink” was a derogatory term – a fact of which I had been blissfully unaware until this time – and that perhaps it would be best if I did not yell it, at the top of my lungs, repeatedly. Gotta learn sometime.

Don’t land yourself on The List.

One far too early, still-dark, blizzarding morning last winter I found myself waiting in an airport for a flight with my boss. We chit-chatted quietly – everyone around us still wiping sleep from unfocused eyes and clutching coffee cups like lifelines. The bland conversation turned to phones ringing, and I ended a sentence a little too loudly with

Ya, but she was totally BLOWING UP.

I took a moment to let this particular mixture of locale and word choice sink fully into my brain – to adequately congratulate myself on the amazing yogi flexibility that allowed me to place both of my feet into my mouth simultaneously.

Then a deep breath, and some more too-loud words, this time intentionally -

…you know, SHE RECEIVED A LOT OF PHONE CALLS ON HER PHONE SO SHE WAS BLOWING UP WITH POPULARITY ON HER PHONE WITH THE RINGING AND THINGS.

Whew. Narrowly dodged that bullet. I mean…NARROWLY AVOIDED A SITUATION THAT COULD HAVE BEEN BAD because I might have ended up on a do-not-fly list by accident for saying the wrong thing. NOT A REAL BULLET. A WORD BULLET. WAIT. NO BULLETS. JUST… UM…YA. nevermind.

o. The top bun of a dichotomy sandwich

I feel compelled to note up front that this prompt populated my brain with the most ideas of any prompt thus far, and yet has simultaneously been the hardest to execute. Thoughts are flying by in my head, but no words worth writing seem to come…

i. Limbo

Somewhere between “out with the old…” and its other half is where I reside. I don’t know what this middle land is called, nor what I do while I’m there. I just know I slip into the space between “old” and “in”.

ii. Efficiency

More than most, I have thoroughly conquered “out with the old…” I am ruthless when it comes to eliminating inefficiencies. I am a systems organizing maximizer analyzing refining genius. A SOMARG, for short. Wasteful systems tremble when they smell the rubber of my combat boots and see the glint of my Sickle of Progress in the sun. I have a gold medal in streamlining. I hold a PhD in bureaucracy eradication. I invented the game Six Degrees, except before it had any association with Kevin Bacon it was a much less glamorous model for getting anything accomplished in six steps or less. Trim the fat.

Onward is my motto. Stagnancy is my greatest fear.

iii. Change

Funny, then, that I have spent the past week dwelling on what the prompt is not. My mind breezed by “out with the old…” and scampered right up to “in with the new“‘s door before freezing and diving into the bushes to hide.

Out with the old is of no concern to me. It’s in with the new where I get stuck.

In with the new is about change.

iv. Near-death

I almost died when:
-Age 3. I moved to a new city.
-Ages 4, 8, 11, 14, 15, 16. I started at a new school.
-Age 17. I started college.
-Age 22. I moved to a new state.
-Age 22. I started my first real job.
-Age 22. I moved into an apartment on my own.
-Age 23. I ended a “relationship”.
-Age 24. I quit my first real job.
-Age 26. I quit my first real job (again).
-Age 26. I moved back to the other state.
-Age 26. My relationship became long distance.
-Ages 26-27. I said goodbye after a visit to or from The Boy (x6).

Out of respect for both your time and my reputation, the list above includes only the more material events, and leaves out those such as:
-Age 5. Trader Joe’s stopped selling my favorite coconut popsicles.

Counting this list alone, I have survived 22 near-death experiences. I’m bulletproof.

v. TP

Yet despite my immortality, tomorrow I will no doubt have to face something atrocious, like a change in the brand of toilet paper carried by my local grocer, and I will almost die.

Again.

vi. Personified

I sit in a saloon, knocking back shots of tequila. I can smell him on the breeze, but I refuse to acknowledge it.

The saloon doors slam open. He barges in with spurs on his boots, and looks around briefly before his eyes settle on me. I can feel his gaze pierce my skull. He saunters over. I glare – a meek glare that cannot stand up to his laser-vision, but a glare nonetheless. He speaks.

“So, Little Miss. We’ve done this 22 times. You ready to walk on your own two feet this time?”

I turn up my nose defiantly.

“Very well then.”

He slings me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and strides back out and into the sunset. I kick and scream the whole way.

Make that 23 near-death experiences.

vii. The bottom bun

It would seem my biggest fear in life manages to simultaneously be change, and lack of change. So I sit in the limbo between.

In the words of a great:

So it goes.