As a trained linguist, I listen for misunderstandings. They provide great insights into conversational dynamics, and of course, it’s a fun mental puzzle. I thought I’d share a couple of my most fun misunderstandings. (Full disclosure: both stories happened on vacation in Italy, years ago. Yes, like many I am daydreaming about the possibility of travel. These popped in my mind recently while reminiscing…Maybe someday soon?) 
 
What would you like to order?

It was a scorching hot August day on the Amalfi coast, and we were a group of sticky hot tourists looking to take a lunch break. We sat down at a beautiful restaurant, one of those you see in the pictures with massive lemons hanging in a trellis up above. Once everyone had studied the menu and decided what they wanted, the server came. My Italian was better than the others’ and so I ordered for everyone, based on what I’d remembered everyone wanted, in the order that I remembered it. The food started to arrive at the table, in a seemingly random order. We were puzzled. Why was a second course coming out with a starter? Where’s my pasta? Why were the dishes coming out in rounds, rather than in order, or all at once? 
 
The server must be incompetent. That was the only possible explanation. Italians were serious about course order. This guy must be a goof ball, or maybe he was just having a bad day? Then suddenly came the aha. The pattern to the “random” order? The dishes were coming to the table in the exact order I had requested them. The laugh was on me! 

Want to go out and play?
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A few years back, I took my niece and nephew, who were 6 and 8, respectively, to Italy to visit family. The kids spoke no Italian, but they made instant friends with some locals. One afternoon the neighborhood kids came by, wanting to play. My niece and nephew went out happily, and about five minutes later, stormed back in, angry and frustrated. 
 
“They are cheats!” they declared. 
 
“I don’t want to play with them anymore.” 
 
I went out to talk with the Italian kids to find out what had happened. They were just as puzzled. “What were you playing?” I asked? And as it turns out, the Italians were not playing freeze tag, as my niece and nephew had thought. And the Italian kids weren’t cheating at freeze tag. Instead, they were playing a similar game, but with different rules. My niece and nephew had assumed the worst—without the benefit of language, they had no idea what had gone wrong.

“When I had children, we didn’t have all this stuff. It’s become all too complicated.” My early days as a mother are a blurr, and yet I remember this moment vividly. My mom, who’d raised four children and at that point had already been a grandmother for decades, revealed to me that she had no idea about motherhood today. How do you correctly install a carseat? How do you manage screentime? How do you use a bottle warmer? The job had evolved. We’d made it more complicated. Some of the innovations were for child safety or health, and some for convenience. Others for marketing. Babies are big business, after all.

​Work for us hasn’t changed all that much. We’ve been working from home for years. We’d pushed through the initial honeymoon period or shock—both reactions are possible when initially transitioning to telework—and we’d settled into a good, solid work-from-home routine years ago. In the past year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many others made an abrupt shift to working from home, without much planning or preparation. Compounded with the stresses of the pandemic, it’s been rough.

But it’s been rough for us veteran telecommuters, too. We explored why. We came up with a hypothesis. Maybe with the rush to connect and simulate the in-person interactions, we have made it all too complicated. 
 
Working from home was not nearly as exhausting before—you guessed it—Zoom. To be fair, it’s Zoom, Teams, whatever. Meeting on the phone (audio only) is way easier than videoconferencing. Here’s what I heard:
 
I've been telecommuting for 18 years. I used to walk all the time while on my calls. I cannot do that when required to take notes and also be on camera. 
 
I am fidgety, and I need to move around when I am working. I used to be able to do that.
 
On video calls, I feel like I am chained to my desk. When on conference calls, I can fold laundry or walk around and Swiff the floors. In a way it helps me concentrate. 

We have all done some personal reflection on this topic, and it’s been analyzed extensively. We’ve read about Zoom fatigue, the particular challenges of uncertainty, etc. Movement is indeed one of the issues. But there are others, including needing to manage your face. Yes, Zoom (and our politeness expectations) forces you to fake a smile. Vignesh Ramachandran's article from Stanford explains it well. There’s lots of brain science to explain our exhaustion. 

So what do we do with this knowledge? And why do I feel the need to pile onto the heap of articles and blogs, when the topic has been discussed already? Well, it’s time to head back into the office. It’s time to start new habits. Let’s remember what my mom said and not make this too complicated. 

I’ve had an earworm the past few weeks: “When you’re smilin', the whole world smiles with you.” The song is in Louis Armstrong’s voice. I was thinking about what I miss most about “normal,” i.e., pre-pandemic, life. 
 
All things considered, one of the top things I miss is exchanging smiles with others. 
 
While research may show that a smile hidden behind a mask can still be ‘heard,’ in my experience, it’s muffled. 
 
This past year of wearing a mask in public has made me realize that I rely heavily on smiling to communicate with people I don’t know. Passing you on a sidewalk? I smile. Waiting at the corner to cross a street? I smile. Expertly zig-zagging in a grocery store? I smile. 
 
It’s as important to communication as words. And it’s been silenced. To compensate, I find myself talking (i.e., a quick "hi") when I don’t want to. Smiles are the shortest, most to-the-pointest exchanges ever. So efficient. So warm. I miss them.
 
And P.S. research tells us the song is true. 

Coronavirus and COVID-19 are not the same thing.

Are you using the terms interchangeably?

(Yikes. I was!)

Coronavirus (also novel Coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2) is the virus; COVID-19 is the disease.

(Like HIV is the virus; AIDS is the disease.)

My email inbox is full of invitations to "Buy now and save."

​Since when does spending lead to saving?

A lot of marketing is based on the premise that "spending less" = saving. But I think of saving as the absence of spending. Since when can I feel good about spending now so I can save?

Server: Do you have any questions about the menu today?

Sonia: I see the scallops come with a "blt," and the "blt" is in quotes. Is this BLT (Bacon, Lettuce, Tomato), or something inspired by the original, such as, Brats, Lochs, and Tofu?"

This is an actual question I posed our server Saturday. He was not sure why I was puzzled. I was not sure why there were quotation marks around "blt." 

Yes, I had to edit the menu before I could order. It happens a lot. It's often a question of punctuation or spelling. 

(It was an actual BLT, in case you were concerned.)

(And don't you want to edit the photo above so it reads "today's?")

​Few things raise self awareness of your own communication style as quickly as hearing your toddler express herself. I have been tuned into language most of my life, and this is one of the greatest delights of motherhood for me.

How many times a week do I think to myself, "Where did she learn that?" "Do I say that?" or "Is that what I sound like?"

Sometimes, for example when big sister is consoling little sister in a kind and gentle way, I am pleased by what I hear. At other times, for example when there are a lot of forceful, "No! No! No's!," I cringe! 

As my older daughter (3.5 years old) is developing her communication (and storytelling) style, I am tuning in to see if I can begin to hear what our "family" communication style is. (Fortunately, it's nothing like hearing a recording of my voice!) 

What has listening to your children taught you about how you communicate?

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This post by A Cup of Jo presents a wonderful way to teach children how to jump into a conversation without interrupting. When you start out studying language and discourse analysis, you often look to children--and pay attention to when they "disrupt"--to identify the "hidden" rules of conversation. Certainly, knowing when to jump in and take a turn at talk is a skill we are not born with. With time (and some nudges from mom and dad, etc.), we learn to listen for the context, the non verbals, etc., and eventually we get it. Most of the time in a conversation, only one person is talking. Thanks to A Cup of Jo for the great tip!

“Okay, love you, bye.”

He hung up the phone, and realized he’d just professed his love to a CLIENT! This is a true story, as told by my friend Ron, about a colleague at work. (Perhaps it’s happened to you?)

For many, “I love you,” is conversation closer. It works like, “Goodbye!” It has its place at the end of many phone conversations or short discussions. It sends a little love.  It wraps things up. It works beautifully, as long as it’s not misdirected (i.e., to a client). That misdirection can happen when “love you” becomes routine—when “love you” fills the same conversational place as “bye,” a word with a lot less heart.

While I love spreading love, I urge you, in the spirit of Valentine’s Day, to put the meaning (and heart) back into these precious words. At least for your Valentine...Agreed?

(P.S. I don’t know how Ron’s colleague resolved things with his client. As my friend tells the story, it ends with ridicule from the cubicle-mates who were within earshot of the gaffe.)

Years ago, I worked for a U.S. university study abroad program in Madrid. Living abroad—if you do it right—pushes you out of your comfort zone and makes you ache for the familiar. You learn about your creature comforts, your quirks, and your hot buttons. And that’s where you grow.

In that job, my primary role was to keep students feeling safe enough that they could dare to “do it right,” that is, be adventurous and go exploring, try new foods and hobbies—and journal, talk through, and process the experience…so they could learn. (It was study abroad, after all.) As a general rule, I talked in terms of ‘cultural values,’ ‘practices,’ and history. I didn’t make lists of cultural dos/don’ts….However, there were a few dos/don’ts we taught students right away:

1. If you’re handed a fork and knife with your croissant (or sandwich, or other item you’d put in the ‘finger-food’ category), use them to eat it.
   
2. If someone approaches you for the two-cheek kiss, follow along. Yes, even if it’s at a job (in their case, internship) interview.
   
3. Don’t clap along with the dancers in a flamenco show. Save your clapping for after the song is over.
   

In flamenco, the dancer is part of the band. With his/her stomping/clapping, he/she is the percussion. If eager tourists get carried away and clap along with the dancers, they can redirect the song. Tuning into this cultural norm about ‘when to clap’ is not so much a cultural do/don’t. It’s about knowing how to communicate. It’s about knowing when you’re part of the conversation vs. a ratified listener. 

When you’re a child and speak out of turn, you might get shushed. In those instances, you’re a ratified listener, and you probably don’t know how to sense when it’s your turn to speak. After years of coaching on how to get a word in edgewise, children figure it out. We all do, eventually. As a tourist at your first flamenco show, you might not think to follow the locals’ lead. Or the house may be packed with tourists. If that’s the case, where do you get your cue?