Things you can say but not write.

There are some things that are better said than written. For example, it probably wouldn't be a problem if you were standing in your backyard watering some plants and you said, "Hi, Barry Gibb. You are my soul mate. I'm going to come into your house while you're asleep and steal your socks, so that I can make a shirt out of them. Then I'm going to fill up your bathtub with pictures of me and my cats." You could say that, and chances are nothing bad would come of it. But if you wrote that down in the wrong place (like in a letter addressed to Barry Gibb), you could get into some trouble. Most likely the police, at the behest of Mr. Gibb, would make an inquiry, leading to an awkward series of questions like, "why did you write that letter? Why do you have so many pictures of you and your cats dressed up like old-timey sailors? What's in that envelope addressed to Olivia Newton-John that's in your mailbox?"

(top to bottom: an old lady, her autographed picture of Barry Gibb)

You know she wants to wear a shirt made from Barry Gibb's socks.

So clearly, we have to be careful. Life is but a delicate traipsing around other people's comfort zones. There are many other things that pass normally in conversation, but cause bemusement when encountered in print. Most of them are not nearly as extreme as that weird letter to Barry Gibb. Here's a real-life example found in an email I received today. No names have been changed, because no one was innocent:

March 15, 2011

Hi Raithburne,

I have tried to call you back and your service does not recognize your name. yes, I would like to attend on the 26^th of march. I can be reached at:

๑๐-แปด-เจ็ดสอง = home

สิบสอง-สี่-๘ดส = cell

The Minister of Older People

"I have tried to call you back and your service does not recognize your name." If, in the flow of a relevant conversation, this sentence was uttered, it would most likely be taken to mean, "I couldn't figure out how to navigate your office's voice mail menu to find your extension." But when read, it seems like nonsense. Like the words just spilled into the email before The Minister of Older People had time to organize them into a cohesive thought.

The thing about writing that's different than speaking is that when words are spoken, they are usually followed by more speaking, allowing enough time for the listener to process the thought but not enough time to actually analyze the form in which it was presented. But if the same words are written, they are there for good, stuck on the page or the screen, to be read over and over. So if the writer doesn't take the time to fine-tune those words, it's all too easy for the reader to pick them apart and find no real meaning behind them.

The more I think about it, though, the more I wonder if what my correspondent meant was that when he reached our general voice mail system, he just started shouting my name into the phone. Which is not how our voice mail system works, but it might explain what he wrote in the email (it also would make a hilarious 30-second video). In light of this possibility, please disregard everything you have just read. Thanks anyway.