Conversations

Do you ever cast your mind back and try to remember what you talked about?  We rarely had deep and meaningful conversations but we did talk.  One or other of us would burst through the door at the end of the day full of what we'd been doing, who we'd seen, what problems needing solving and then, over a glass of wine or two, we'd talk and we'd listen and by the time we went to bed we'd be talked out.  In the summer we'd sit out in the garden until it was dark sometimes listening to the radio, sometimes reading but often talking and always together and I miss those times.  Over the past two and a half years I've learnt an awful lot including, mostly, when to talk and when to keep quiet.  In the old days we would wake in a morning and talk about the day ahead, now I keep quiet; I used to burst through the door with a thought I wanted to share, now I keep quiet; I used to ask for an opinion on everything and anything, now I keep quiet.  Interestingly the one thing I can still do as long as I choose the moment correctly is share a joke I've seen on fb.  Ash can't cope with funny comments but visual jokes he still gets and that's something I cherish.  So I've learnt when to keep quiet but I've also learnt to watch for conversational openings, some topic that will get him talking and create some sort of connection however brief.  In a morning if he's watching the sheep out of the window I'll make a comment and sometimes that's enough, when we're out for a walk I wait for him to say something and then see if I can get it to lead somewhere but mostly I'm silent and my silence seems to give him head space to think his own thoughts, to work things out in his own way and eventually, if I'm silent for long enough, he sometimes starts a conversation himself.  It's not a give and take conversation but he will point to something and comment or he'll see something on the television and have an opinion and it's better than nothing for me and better than confusion for him so I go with it and see where it leads.

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