on the way to the mountain house.

We hold a conversation, hold it in our tiny little hands with our fingers held together in the shape of a cup so as not to let any words slip through.

We gripe as coworkers do, both talking more and more excitedly, building on the excitement of the other who is building on my own. We have thought these exact same thoughts that we now put into words, thought them earlier today in fact. They did not make us angry then, but now, someone agrees with us, and we are full of our righteous indignation.

We argue the same idea, and though no one disagrees, we feel the need to illustrate the idea with many examples and what we consider to be very eloquent and well-thought-out points. We continue to argue our popular point as if it were threatened, as if anyone present felt the slightest bit differently. We gesture dramatically because these gestures also illustrate the opinion that we both share.

We do not listen to each other. We listen to the tone to make sure the other still agrees, listen to the voice without listening to the words to know when they are done so that we can tell yet another relevant story.

After it is all over and we are left with nothing but the glow of our anger and excitement, we could not recall for our own lives anything the other said, but we leave with the idea that it is in fact that best conversation we've had in a long time.