I got an e-mail the other day from a reader. Here’s the crux of it:
“I just now got off the phone leaving a message with a beautiful girl I met online. I must have re-recorded the message 20 times.”
Ah yes, the phone. I’ve talked about how much I dislike it before.
One nerve-wracking experience is getting a new job and a new phone — and then having to set up voice mail for it. For whatever reason even though I’m in my office by myself recording the message, I still stutter out my name. So I have to do it over and over again. Then there’s the rest of the message. I focus so much on getting my name out that I forget about the rest of it and end up bumbling through that, too. You’d think I’d just write something down and slowly read it.
I’ve also enjoyed getting a new cell phone and then opening the box when someone else is in the room (or in my office). So then you check out your shiny new thing — and somehow the realization that you need to set up your voicemail comes up. “Eh, well, I can do that later.” Why don’t you just do it now? “Um …”
The phone system that the reader mentions above is much better than before, of course. Before you had one shot to leave a message — and had to sometimes face the indignity of getting cut off (while you’re trying to stutter out your name) by the time limit. I always wondered what those sounded like when people heard them …
If you have a comment or story about stuttering, please do send it along!
Hello. I stutter. 