I strictly follow this columnist every week. More than being a vibrant and an inspiring writer, she is bold enough to speak her heart out and let the world hear it. With that, she can convince what she says effortlessly. But, sadly, not this time. Had she not contradicted what she herself said the last time, it could have deserved some pondering.


This is one instance which makes us fellow readers judge how the writers in people say things rather than what they say. To throw some light on what actually happened this time, as a sequel to her last writing, she merely contradicted her previous one, providing an insight into ‘so much’ of her thought about it and thus came up with alternative theories about the same.


In case of a writer as successful as she, she was lucky to have some more to write upon. More importantly, she was the luckiest because she could write! I imagine a situation where somebody had given the same speech and during the immediate session, apologized and gave up alternative theories saying he just decided to give it more thought.


Ever since early days, we have been reminded to watch our words. Leaving apart racist or sexist comments, the school days were where we could not speak out of turn and emphasize the same. To give it some thought, we also have been careful what to say, because most of us have feared speaking out the wrong answer believing it to cause embarrassment and make a subject of mockery.


Like most people call it courtesy, we hold on to our words and do not directly tell people what we want to. As elders put it, one of the four things that do not come back happens to be the spoken word. What is once said is said and cannot be undone. That probably explains why our early speeches were monitored stringently.


We are not unaware of how big shots have been held down for saying things they were not supposed to.  Some, like words by the former US president have been compiled into books. Given any opportunity, he would not be able to call off his reputation. Just a Google search and dozens of other celebrities fall on the same track. Despite making international fools out of themselves they have personalized how important it is to know what you are speaking. While many do ward it off as ‘publicity stunts’ in today’s time, we can still judge their ways of publicizing themselves.


Talking about people in the real world, we cannot take back what once is said. Apologizing does help, but definitely takes time. Time may heal the harsh wounds, but the scars are there to stay. This is where all our childhood socialization fits in. Not only should we maintain our habit of not speaking out of turn, but be careful enough to value our words and not in any way give out the wrong answer. The strict surveillance does not mean we do not at all speak what we have to but it definitely means to weigh our words. Giving it a more clever approach, we could play with words, giving it a sweeter touch.


And with it, come Plato and his famous line, ‘Wise men speak because they have something to say, fools because they have to say something.’