I hate listening to myself on radio or watching myself on T.V.

It makes me feel so self-conscious. If I laugh too loud, or gesture too much… Radio is a bit better but not much and I’m always worried about saying something stupid! Or something I just shouldn’t.

But Shelagh Rogers was such a sweet host. And she made me feel so comfortable with her questions, it really was a pleasure to be interviewed on her show The Next Chapter.

It’s on podcast, and you can hear it here: http://www.cbc.ca/thenextchapter/MT/2010/04/post_1.html

I’m right at the beginning! And I don’t think I sound too silly at all. In fact in some spots I’m downright intelligible.

Like I’ve mentioned before, way back even before I got published, I was so sure I’d be a successful author that I’d be having imaginary interviews with Sixty Minutes while brushing my teeth, then catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror, my mouth dripping foam, and feel like an utter loon.

Mind you, back then I also made a list of people I wanted to be interviewed by one day. There was Pamela Wallin, Barbara Frum, Peter Gzowski, Larry King and of course the Staff of Sixty Minutes.

Pamela Wallin and Barbara Frum are both off air. Shelagh Rogers wasn’t as big as she is now. But Shelagh would definitely have been on my list.

Larry hasn’t called yet. But hey, there’s still time.

Some authors shy away from public appearances, radio and T.V., but I’m not like that.

In some ways I wish I was.

A while ago when I was doing some diversity workshops in the Avon-Maitland county down near Stratford, I had the opportunity to see some plays at the Stratford Festival.

I’ve always loved the theatre, and I got to see George Bernard Shaw’s Caesar and Cleopatra. There was a line in there that really caught my attention. Caesar was talking about people who talk alot. He liked them. He said they eventually revealed themselves.

I tend to be like that.

I’ve always had to learn to bite my tongue, and as a result I’m always afraid, in such a situation, that I’ll not only embarrass myself, I’ll embarrass someone else. That actually worries me more.

I can handle embarrassment! That’s what blushing is for!  But I don’t like foisting that on anyone else.

And yet, if someone specifically tells me something is a secret, I can tuck it away without the least bit of temptation to tell it.

But they have to tell me it’s a secret.

Ah me, maybe one day I’ll learn wisdom.

There’s a famous Guyanese saying that my hubby sometimes quotes. The empty vessel makes the most noise.

It’s kind of in the same line as ‘it’s the shallow brook that babbles’.

I’d hate to be viewed as a babbling brook.

I went to a writers’ conference a little while ago and met a lady who babbled. It made me cringe to think that I might be coming across that way.

I guess it’s one of the reasons why I try to stay pretty low key when I’m not ‘on air’. I think you do need to crank up the enthusiasm when you’re on air or you’ll come across flat and boring.

The show airs on April 5th, that’s Monday on CBC Radio 1 at 1 pm, and then is repeated on Saturday at 4 pm.

I talk all about Wanting Mor.