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9 November, 2000
People aren't always up front with their wishes. We beat around the bush or play coy. Sometimes we don't come out and say what we really think for fear of hurting someone's feelings or starting an argument. Some people are so used to this behavior, that they just assume that anyone who says anything publicly must have a hidden agenda.
Of course, sometimes we do have ulterior motives. There are times we are in a situation where it seems best for us not to be explicit and forthcoming. Occasionally, we find ourselves forced into a position of keeping something secret.
Several years ago, when I was attending a community college, I was appointed as the student representative on a professor's tenure committee. Before the year was through, certain problems were brought to the committee and the school's attention about the professor. These problems had to do with the her professional conduct with certain students and with other professors. State law forbade any of us on the committee or associated with the subsequent investigation from making any public statements about the matter.
The end result was that the school decided not to offer the professor tenure. She protested, sued, and otherwise caused a big scene over it. She was allowed to say, publicly and to the press, absolutely anything she wanted to about the situation. So she claimed that the action which was taken was done because prudes in the school did not approve of her lifestyle. And all of us involved had to sit quietly as her supporters, including my fellow students, called us all sort of nasty names. They even organized protests and sent threatening letters.
That was very hard for me. As the student body representative on a committee that was only peripherally involved in the complaint process, I had had only a tiny role in the affair. Even so, I knew that the actions which were taken were not entered into lightly. And there was never anything personal involved. But many people outside the process believed that it was some kind of petty witch hunt.
Years afterwards, I still had repercussions falling on me from that event. It was extremely difficult to sit there and take the false accusations and insults.
I've found myself in similar situations over the years. Usually the situation is quite a bit less important than someone's career and a pending lawsuit. But it doesn't make it any easier. Keeping quiet is hard. We're social animals. Not only that, but neurological scientists now believe that talking outloud about something we are worried about, confused about, or just trying to understand, helps us process the data. The mere act of assembling the thoughts into sentences and speaking the words allows us to understand our thoughts and feeling better than just sitting there and thinking in silence.
I was very glad to learn about that finding, I think it was last year in an article in Scientific American. You see, I do have a secret, one that I used to be terribly embarassed about: I talk to myself. When I'm alone I hold long, complex conversations with no one at all. Sometimes they are imaginary conversation with my friends. I practice how I will explain something to someone. Sometimes I talk about something I'm writing. I describe the problem I'm having with a story and try to hash out how to fix it. Many times, I simply have conversations with myself for no other purpose than to figure something out. The more difficult the problem I'm facing, the longer the conversations.
When I was a small child, most of the adults in my life assumed I was talking to an imaginary friend. As I got older, they became less comfortable with this habit. I soon learned that it was best to make sure no one was around before I started. Because I did a lot of walking as a kid, I got in the habit of having these conversations as I walked from one place to another.
I still feel momentarily embarassed if someone, even Michael, walks in on me while I'm talking to myself. It's just too deeply ingrained in my psyche that I'm not supposed to be doing it. But I've learned, over the last few years, that a lot of my friends and acquaintances do the same thing. That knowledge, along with the new studies about how speaking aloud helps us think, makes me feel a little less embarassed about it.
Sometimes secrets aren't embarassing. Sometimes they're just annoying. At a convention I attended recently, someone tried to pull me into their hidden agenda. The person is question began by offering a gift to the literary society which I was representing at the convention. It soon became clear that the person was actually trying to create an incident. There was another person at the convention who has a past history of flying into rages and attacking people. The person offering me the "gift" wanted to get the other guy kicked out of the convention and banned from future events. All I had to do was sell copies of the other guy's product at a significantly lower price than he was selling it. If confronted, I could say quite honestly that they had been donated to us, and that I had been told by the person donating them that I could sell them at whatever price I wished and the literary society could keep the money.
I wasn't exactly thrilled with this plan. I tried to explain that I didn't want to be involved in such a scheme, but the person thrust the items into my hands and literally ran away before I could finish my sentence. So I had to keep them out of sight and hope that no one was spreading a rumor that we were selling these things cheap to fuel the hoped-for outburst.
I did manage to get the items returned to the "donor" and explain why I didn't want to be involved. Even though I got out of the intrigue, I was left in a mildly uncomfortable position. Someone I had been on friendly terms with had tried to trick me into doing something that could have caused me trouble and possibly resulted in physical injury. Yet, if I made a big deal out of the situation at the event, word would get around, there might still be an outburst, and someone else might get hurt.
We all survived. There were no further problems between the two individuals, so far as I know. But I'm still left with a bad taste in my mouth, nonetheless.
I don't like secrets. I understand why some of them are important to keep. But I still don't like them.
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This page is copyright 2000 by Gene Breshears. Photograph is copyright 1998 by Julie Rampke. All Rights Reserved.
