I have / had seen rivers,wells etc drying up, even for that matter relationships drying up but never realized that over time even words could dry up.
Four and half decades of my life, I was blessed with innumerable friends and acquaintances. I used to talk talk talk and then talk some more. If there was one thing which was bottomless for me, it was conversation. I loved having conversations or would have long one's with people. There were times when an extremely reticent person will open up and talk and the conversation will go on for hours. I remember an incident when I used to work in news channel wherein a print editor came in to ask something around 7pm and I had packed up for the day but, a one minute ask became 3 hour conversation with sandwich dinner and we left at 10pm. That guy was known to be a man of limited words(verbally), high intelligence and a night owl., and I used to be slightly wary of his temper (for which he was equally famous) but after that conversation, I saw a new version of him. Conversations or words those days, used to either heal,hurt or hug or give happiness ,sense of belonging or living.
Such incidents are many and not only in office, this used to happen in local trains also. I used to have conversation with total strangers for an hour (mind you, really interesting topics) and then we used to walk away at our respective stations or become friends for life.
Words were like clothes for me, constant in my life ,sometimes excessive, sometimes short, sometimes bold, sometimes rude... I always felt words or rather conversations are like your body organs, will be always with you, always used.
But now, I realised that words do dry up, conversations do get stilted, especially over phone. Situations and age are the seeds of drought, that dries up words. Nowadays, when I meet someone in social situation I can't move beyond pleasantries about health or weather.
With strangers, I just smile and nod, that's it. With friends I don't know what to talk over phone and these are people with whom I have like, chatted for hours and still felt bereft of time.
It has been a slow process, when words became scarce ; like when a person accuses you of manipulation and you know none of your words will make a dent in their belief or when a friend accuses you of intentional disappearance from their life, you know words can't make them rewind their thoughts or when you feel like talking a lot, wanting to describe the happiness you felt or something that moved you and you realize there is nobody to talk to,then words dry up (There is a song in kannada which says ( there is only one said word on my lips but 301 unsaid words are in my heart : "Tutiyalli bantante maatu onde ondu, hedeyalli ulllididdu 301 - )
Nowadays , words are not like clothes to me but they are like face cream or powder , okay if you use it or okay if not , doesn't make a difference as such.
I want to water it, make it sprout out and have a dense jungle but to paraphrase Sonakshi Sinha's dialogue from Dabang
" Mujhe baton se dar nahi lagta hai saab
Rishton ki samaj se dar lagta hai"
yes my wife and myself we agree that we Indians are now becoming same as western people where people do not mingle much even with neighbor.
Today's kids are more into Digital Screens.
we Indian's are by nature talkative let people keep telling us we have Anxiety !