The benefits of being a chatterbox

I am a chatterbox. So often I have been told as a child, a teen, an adult, a woman that I talk a lot, have and voice opinions, argue too much – and this has often been framed as an undesirable part of my personality; an undesirable trait. If I were a boy or a man, undoubtedly this part of my personality wouldn’t be perceived so negatively… but it’s not ladylike or becoming for me to out myself as a loud, brash feminist so early on in the blog post. I work so hard to be subtle about these things, after all…

I’ve always enjoyed talking; I like talking to people, hearing them talk, telling my stories, hearing their stories. I talk when I am nervous to calm myself down (which is especially difficult at the dentist), I talk out loud to process my feelings, I am talking out loud to myself in my head as I am typing these words. My internal monologue is awesome; it even has several personalities and voices for when I want different perspectives.

My partner is a man of concise, precise and considered words, who often has to wait patiently as I chat to others. On one particular time he mentions frequently, I was 7 months pregnant waiting outside with our dog as he popped into Tesco for a few bits. He came out 10 minutes later, and I was deep in conversation with a man about his life story - his divorce, his disillusionment with his career in teaching. He then gave a treat to our dog, we said goodbye and he left. My partner exclaimed about how every time I am left alone I end up chatting to someone random about their life story. I thought about this moment a lot during the pandemic when you couldn’t speak to anyone, and it was the thing I didn’t realise I missed so desperately, until we started to go out again.

My two little ones are chatterboxes too, especially my littlest who makes me look like a woman of few words. (I do not know how this is possible and yet it is.) Our dog has loud opinions too, and then there’s my partner as the calm eye of the storm in our audible, twittering chaos. I get into conversations less now I’m a mum, perhaps because I am always busy trying to get them to keep their clothes on in public, stop them experimenting with using their foot to hold a spoon, so there’s less opportunity to talk… and do much else really.

One thing I’ve considered recently, seeing as my little ones are both so chatty, that I want both of them to only think positivity of their chatterbox qualities - they are both boys so perhaps their experience of this will be different from mine. So, these are some positive moments that have come from me randomly chatting to people.