Toast

In an effort to improve my apparently faulty communication skills, I attended a meeting of the local Toast-misters, with the intention of making a go of it, despite less than ideal first impressions. A lot of practiced smiles, the American flag set up, the prevalence of portfolios, all gave the impression of work meetings more than anything remotely enjoyable.

The Pledge of Allegiance I'd not expected, but I've done the army, standing to attention for the flag. Hell, the roller derby has everyone stand for the national anthem before bouts, admittedly the Hendrix version, but hand over heart the same as a baseball game. I let this slide. The meeting leader for the evening had a stilted joviality, but this is just one guy, let it go. They inducted new members, ok, ceremonial and rules of order, fine, formality has it's place.

Then the two prepared speakers. One young guy, difficulty with grammar and strange hand gestures, the spouted opinions grated, and my resolve began to waver. An elderly woman gave her speech on humor, lacking any humor, three jokes, one of which was baffling, the second poorly told, the third featuring an ethnic stereotype and a false premise. The hurting intensified.

Then a speaker setting up topics to assign for extemporaneous speakers looked around the room, and straight at me, and said he knew everyone there. This surprized me, as I'd not so much as introduced myself to him. One of his assignments was to give a pro-United Way speech. All I could think of was the trouble they'd run into a few years ago, with huge amounts of their contributions going to admin costs. And the heavy handed tactics used on me, as an employee. Thankfully, I was not put on the spot that evening. I prepared myself to politely leave, in case.

And finally, the evaluations. Ok, some credit for being encouraging. None at all for my purpose, since even the criticism seemed off base. No mention made of the ethnic joke being inappropriate.

I walked home with plans for the podcast idea. It had been so hard the last time I'd tried, using garageband. Mostly to do with my own unpracticed speaking voice. Time to try again, and stick to it. Beats enduring an endless Speech 101 class.