You know, there are people who are mostly quiet. They utter few words. Some of these people are just quiet and perhaps really don't know what to say. Some quiet people are extremely smart while others are extremely dumb. Unless they say something, it's hard to tell. Or maybe you can observe them doing something really smart or really dumb. Then you can know for sure. But ultimately you never really know these people. I think that's the way they want it.
You know other people who talk all the time and you find that you tend to tune them out after realizing that they are not saying anything contextual - that they might as well be somewhere else or alone for that matter. There never seems to be a need for you to say anything. They seem to need another person to have an excuse to talk, but conversation where ideas are exchanged is not the point.
There are a couple of sub-groups to this second group. One is what I call the show and tell group. It can function without any show at all. The assumption is that their reporting on recent happenings in their lives is at the center of the universe. They are in a broadcast mode and nothing will distract them until Mr. and Mrs. North and South America and all the ships at sea have heard it all. In a survey of thousands of these people they were asked to describe the people to whom they were talking. To the person, they reported that the people to whom they were talking all seemed to have a far away look, and their eyes seemed to be glassy in appearance.
The other sub-group is the opinionators. The idea is that their opinion is the long awaited truth that will somehow change the world and make it a better place to live. They also do not need a response, other than, perhaps a nod or blink now and then. If you really want to make points with someone like this, wait until they take a breath (everyone does now and then) and say something like, "Absolutely!".
I'm not sure this next group is unique or just another sub sub part of the opinionator group. This is the person with a cause. The Evangelist. Whereas it is possible to get along with the quiet person, the compulsive talker and even the opinionator, it is almost impossible to tolerate the person who sincerely believes he or she has a lock on the truth about anything.
Give the Evangelist an official document - such as The Book of Mormon, the Koran, the Torah or The Bible - and you have not only truth but also the "evidence" of that truth. According to them, of course. And of course all these documents are all Divinely inspired by the god of choice.
I've often wished that I were the quiet man. Alas, I am not. I often speak when not to speak would have been more eloquent. I fall, I believe, in the middle of the second and third categories. I seem to have something to say about everything, which, it could be argued, is the same thing as not having anything at all to say. But I hasten to warn you: I do not intend to shut up. I will promise not to seek to evangelize you, mainly because I don't have a lock on the truth. I just like the sound of my voice.
Like you didn't know that?
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