Thursday, January 10, 2008

She won't stop talking!


At first it's cute. When I come home Big Sister has a lot to say. And I mean a lot.
She tells what her job was at school, what games she played, what special projects they made.
But then she just keeps going. Question after question after question.
If you ignore her, the questions just get louder. The sound level goes from dull roar to jet plan landing.
We try to be nice, but eventually it just slips out, "shut up. Just stop talking!"
I'm not proud of saying it and I always regret it. I'm actually really scared of the day she decides she doesn't want to talk to me anymore.
So more and more I try to grin and shake my head at her. I think of it as training for work. At the newspaper there are generally five people in front of me all at once asking questions while I'm trying to read a story and put together pages that are due in 30 minutes.
Mostly I tune them out and only answer what really needs attention.
I can't do that at home. My family needs my full attention when I'm there, so I take a deep breath, close my eyes and refocus.
"Yes, big sister, what happened next."

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