Michael Snyder

In middle school I was routinely summoned to the front of the class, along with my ersatz girlfriend Michelle Bobbitt, to “finish” the many conversations we’d been conducting while our very large, very muscular teacher had been trying to lecture our class on the finer points of some American war or Black History Month. His name was Lovelace and he wore enormous eyeglasses, a bulbous afro, and silk shirts left unbuttoned at the wrists. When Mr. Lovelace sarcastically invited Michelle and me to stand up and share with our fellow students whatever we’d been discussing that was so important that it couldn’t wait until after class, we did. Or rather, she did. I just followed along and tried to minimize the fallout by exercising my budding sense of humor.

My history teacher in high school looked exactly like Woody Allen. (That’s no exaggeration either. If you ever come to my mom’s house in Virginia, I’ll show you my yearbook.) He called me into his office one day for a conference. I was only a little bit nervous because we had a great relationship. So good, in fact, that we were constantly trading friendly insults during his lectures.  It was a chronic case of one-upmanship. (And for the record, he always started it.) When I arrived at his office, he cleared his throat and said, “We have a problem.” In retrospect, I can see now that his use of the plural possessive was more for his benefit than mine. He was the paid professional, the molder of young minds with responsibility and accountability to think about. I was just a dumb kid. But I played along. "Our problem,” it seemed, was that our constant in-class barb swapping had put us months behind the time line in our syllabus. In other words, if we didn’t behave, American History as we knew it would have ended just prior to the first of the World Wars.(Talk about the power of words!)

Throughout all thirteen of my formative school years (including kindergarten), the single disciplinary issue that cropped into every parent/teacher conference was the fact that I talked too much. My teachers were quick to point out, however, that it was they—the actual teachers—I was conversing with. And since they copped to contributing to the delinquency of an overly talkative youth, I never got in too much trouble.

Of course, all my incessant babbling came to a screeching halt when I showed up for Introduction to Speech Making in college. I liked attention, sure, but only on my own terms. This was different. I had to prepare what I was going to say beforehand, then stand in front of an entire classroom and talk—on demand! I found this mortifying, so much so that it became the pivotal course for the first half of my nine-year college experience. It served as a kind of gateway drug for the rest of my academic life. On the day of my first prepared speech, I skipped class, something I became quite proficient at. It was the first time I’d ever made a grade below a C, something else I got pretty good at. I can't be certain, but I think that's about the time I developed my habit of ending consecutive sentences with the word "at."

(The one bright spot in my Speech class was the lecture I gave entitled, “How To Make Weird Noises On A Guitar.” I received an A, a bit of enthusiastic applause, and praise from my teacher that included the word “inspired.” This speech taught me the value of props when speaking before large groups. However, the point of this parenthetical digression is one of Warning: Obscure classic rock reference to follow).

It was around this same time that I decided to take Joe Perry’s advice and Let The Music Do The Talking for me. I spoke less and played a lot more guitar. Looking back though, it’s obvious my unending quest for fretboard heroics was just a different form of babbling. On balance, my musical contributions were mostly devoid of both soul and substance. But it was not for a lack of trying. Anyhow, I don’t think I’m overstating matters when I say that a lot of my current neuroses were fermented during these two decades of musical frustration.

Over the span of my mid-twenties to mid-thirties it began to dawn on me slowly that all that noise I’d been making had a point. It seemed I really did have something to say, but just couldn’t get the medium right. That’s when I started staying up late, making up stories and writing them down. (My inner optimist likes to imagine all that guitar playing made me a better typist. My inner pragmatist argues that all that time and money spent studying music basically amounted to really expensive typing lessons.)

It’s easier to see now that those first few decades of life for what they were—my first draft. I hadn’t yet learned the art of self-editing, or even self-control. My sense of humor needed a governor. What I thought was communication was a lot of white noise.

Today I find endless amusement in the fact that I make at least a part of my living by babbling—only now it’s mostly in my head and on paper. Although the amount of actual American currency I receive remains nominal, it still has a tendency to burn a hole in my pocket. But now I've learned to cherish every last nickel.

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Michael Snyder received the first copy of his second novel in the mail today. So, if you too would like to experience the mind altering bliss of tearing into a package that includes Return Policy, a novel by Michael Snyder, then maybe you oughta order your own copy while supplies last!

Operators are standing by for this limited time offer!

(Actually, I'd bet the operators are seated. And the time is really only limited by whichever brand of eschatology butters your biscuit. Still...)