I love voices.
There is a definite link in my mind between the sound of someone’s voice and how that person actually physically looks. It is part of the process of communication, to hear someone’s words and see that person at the same time. But if communication is, at its heart, the art of two people relating together, what happens when one of them isn’t visible? What do you do when you can’t see the person you’re trying to say something to? This normally isn’t a problem. People communicate through phones all the time. Email is essentially only a one-sided method of talking to someone. Even the venerable hand-written letter is an exercise in solo communication; an attempt to reach out to someone without actually expecting an immediate response.
One of my favorite things to do is listen to a group of people talking and try to imagine what each person must look like. Then I open my eyes and try to see how close my internal picture was. Sometimes I scare myself in my accuracy. Most often I scare myself in my inaccuracy.
I’ve been known to sit on benches in crowded train stations with my eyes closed and just listen to the tone of the people sitting or standing nearby. It’s voyeuristic for me, though not in the way you’d think. I’m not listening for their words necessarily, although sometimes it’s kind of hard not to notice what the topic of conversation may be, especially in train stations. I’m listening for the tones, cadences and rhythms of their speech.
There’s an involvement that goes along with talking with someone and seeing them at the same time, something beyond just the subtle cues of communication that we all send out through body language. My desire to be connected to the people with whom I am communicating can create a sense of ambivalence for me. I love talking on the phone because I can let my mind go wild about the person that I’m talking with, but on the other hand I hate it because I can’t actually see that person in front of me. I like to be involved. So, the method of communication that is to me the most fascinating, fulfilling and yet the most frustrating by far is radio.
I should clarify what I mean by radio. Try as I might, I’ve never been able to get into regular music programs. I’ve tried all genres from Top 40 countdowns to local indie garage bands to all-Dvorak-all-the-time classical. Nothing can keep my attention for longer than about twenty minutes. There’s really only one kind of radio that can draw me in. I am an avid talk radio junkie. It doesn’t matter what the topic is, I will pay attention to it. I’ll listen to the big guys on NPR or the little guys on the local access station. I used to listen to the techie hour program on a college radio station several years ago, not because I know thing one about computers but because it was a bunch of people sitting around a microphone and having a discussion over the airwaves. I didn’t even know what a USB port was, but I was fascinated anyway.
What gets me about talk radio is the same thing that gets me about listening to people in train stations: I can’t see the person who is talking. And to make matters worse, I don’t know the person individually, so I can’t even guess that he or she looks like. It is infuriating to me, and like a good little addict I come back for more every time. I’ve stayed in cars for up to an hour after I just went to the grocery store just to get milk, bread and eggs just to listen to a radio program.
There’s an enigma to talk radio personalities. They do for me what the standard television or movie personality can’t – they create mystery. I want to know all about them. What does this person look like? How would his or her appearance affect my perception of the subject matter? Why don’t they want me to see them? What are they, chicken? I want to be able to connect with the writer so badly, to understand things from the perspective inside that wonderful little head of which I am only afforded a simple preview.
It is definitely an issue with radio. Even with a novel, I don’t have a problem. With a book I expect to sit down and listen without talking back for a good while. I am, after all, hearing a story of some kind and it would be rude for me to interrupt the teller. But even though the author of a book is obviously not there with me, there’s always that comforting little half-intimate bio on the back page that gives me a hint of what’s going on with that person. Without the little picture and paragraph blurb to accompany me, there’s this conspicuous absence present that invades me.
And while I maintain that everyone’s voice when it is broadcast on radio sounds distinctive, I particularly like listening to it when the contributor has a distinguishing voice. A little bit of gravel in the throat or a dash of a vocal crack makes my day. There’s a reason why I look forward to hearing Ira Glass, Sarah Vowel and Starlee Kine. That’s to say nothing about hearing someone speak who has any kind of an accent. I have yet to hear an accent that I didn’t want to hear more of, and this is speaking as someone who has been to Texas.
Hearing a unique voice on the radio has the effect on me that drinking a glass of warm milk when you’re trying to go to sleep does for most people: it reminds me of the essential distinctiveness of people. It gives us permission to remember that no one is a carbon copy of anybody else. And that’s also part of the fascination with the lack of a visual to tie that distinctiveness to. We are a visual society, so when the visual cue is removed from the equation, it lets us experience something in a completely different and enthralling way. I am exasperated by the whole process, but I’ll be damned if I’m not coming back time and time again, the good little talk radio junkie that I am.
