Not Much. How About You?

 Few questions annoy me more than “What have you been up to lately?” and “Have any plans for the day?” Because I’m a woman who embraces spontaneity, any plans I make are whatever appeals most at the moment and can change in the middle of a single step. As for what I’ve been up to, I’d love for my answer to be “No good,” but the truth is much less interesting and I hate to be a bore.

I read, I write, I walk in a dying portion of the city. Without travel, most of my life is interior and I wonder if that’s the way it will be forever. I’ve become that person I loathe, a woman without stories, which is probably why queries about what I’ve been doing or what I will do flick me on the raw. And yet everyone seems to feel this is an appropriate conversation opener, from bank tellers to baristas to members of my own family.

When I was a bookseller, the question I was asked most frequently was “What have you been reading lately?” It was one that turned me mute, as my brain shuffled through all the books I’d made my way through in the past week or so. They blurred into the books I’d handled, the ones I’d recommended to customers, the ones I’d chosen for the store’s newsletter and made me want to reply, “The National Inquirer.” Eventually I’d choose one title from the literary mush that clogged my mind and stammer out a brief sentence or two about it. But that was a problem of abundance. Now whatever I have to serve up is embarrassingly meager and often repetitive. 

It’s a pre-covid custom that deserves to die and hangs on only because “How are you?” or “How have you been?” dabble in matters that nobody wants to discuss. Health may become the latest conversational taboo, replacing sex, religion, and politics. It might lead to a mention of death and there’s a topic nobody wants to touch upon. 

I’ve never been adept at small talk, which might be the reason why for years I cut my own hair. The stream of pleasant, inconsequential conversation that’s essential at parties and dinner tables is a skill I’ve never acquired. Since there have been few meals and other gatherings with strangers in the past three years, I’ve lost any pretense I might have had of “working a room.” But the mental paralysis I faced in those past situations has infiltrated daily life in this persistent and annoying form of interrogation. I’d gladly return to “Read any good books lately?”

Better yet, why not ask “What’s been on your mind lately?” Perhaps not posed by those amiable bank tellers but it wouldn’t go amiss when used in conversation with family and friends. Replies could range from “Why is it so difficult to find a good lipstick without paying a fortune?” to “What in the hell can be done about the opioid use on our streets?” Who knows? When we talk about what we think, this may just lead to what we’ve done. Want to try it?