This is in response to an old prompt about whether I prefer my voice on tape or face on vidoe, but it brought up good memories that I like to flip through. In college, my freshman year, I was best friends with two girls, Ann and Ali. Ali’s roommate moved out of her dorm room for some reason I don’t remember, and one night, inspired by Fiegling from a Romanian friend and cheap wine from a fake ID, she let us take magic marker to her walls to decorate.
When we were finished, we talked about our respective contributions on a little hand-held device, describing the pictures and supplying little explanations. I remember actually saying, “I hate the way my voice sounds on tape,” and employing stupid accents and pitch changes to mask my true voice sound.
Some years later, Ali went to Germany to study, and Ann and I would exchange audio cassettes that were pretty funny, and especially more so now. (This was waay before Skype.) By this time, I was too grown up to worry about the sound of my voice on tape. I remember one night, Ann and I were in her efficiency and both talking to the tape recorder like Ali was there with us. I was telling Ali something I was learning about America. Ann was in the other room and yelled, “What?” I asked if she heard me, and she said, “Something about a haircut.”
I absolutely lost my shit, and I don’t know why. I couldn’t even talk I was laughing so hard, this high-pitched laugh I had seemed to inherit from my grandpa. I was like:
I Didn't Just Wake Up This Morning With A Craving 