Let's Not Talk About Weather

In common conversation, we pull from a bucket of programmatic phrases and questions to loosen the lips before the real discussion begins.

We ask someone "How are you?” expecting the response to be “I’m good. How are you?”? Rarely does someone respond noting that they had a lousy sleep because they had a dream that their Dad walked them down the aisle at their wedding, even though that never happened because he died before he had the chance to (obviously my internal response sometimes).

Next, we offer a comment or query on the weather, because weather happens everywhere. We ask rhetorical questions like “wow can you believe how little snow we’ve had this year?” to which someone responds “Gosh! I just can’t believe it!” Rarely does someone respond noting that they can believe it because of global warming, the earth changing, and other easily accessible points from the news.

Lastly, we turn to the most complex question from our bucket of programmatic questions: “How did you get here?” expecting the response to be that they took the Hutch to the Merritt, NJ Transit to the 1 Train, or a Brompton bicycle. Rarely does someone respond that they arrived by putting the address into google and following the directions, like everyone else seems to do.

These typical topics often suck up a lot of our daily word count as we continue to go through the motions upon each new greeting. You could understand why some people prefer to remain indoors, to avoid the wasted time of commenting on the rain, a natural and common occurrence that can be seen with our very own eyes. Yet, video calls seem to go through the same motions, as if the questions are more intriguing due to the mystery of what could be happening behind the templated zoom background.

How can we take these programmatic questions and transform them into opportunities to get to know someone better or learn something new? Instead of “How are you?” Can we ask a more precise question like “How is your month going?” This question could still prompt an automatic response of “its going well” but by honing in on a time frame, perhaps the question receiver will answer with an anecdote from that month. Instead of telling someone about the weather in your area, perhaps you can share how the weather will impact your day, offering that the 62 degree temperature means you will get to join your run group after work. And instead of asking someone what route they traveled, why not ask if they encountered anything exciting on their way to meet you?

If we are not the driver of these programmatic questions, we can change the course of the conversation with our less common answers, sharing with someone how we are ally doing, using the weather as a jumping off point to share details of an upcoming trip, or offering a fun fact about your transit like how 250 Citibike angel points increases your time to dock from 45 to 60 minutes.

However grating it is to continually say “I’m good, and it is sunny and I took the C train” these common pleasantries exist for a reason. It allows people a couple of minutes to engage in non-controversial dialogue, hardly revealing any major character traits, bringing people onto the same playing field. But is it worth it? Surely 90 seconds of weather banter a few times a day is not so much of a time suck that we should consider cutting back, right?

Before going off the rails sharing all of your innermost thoughts and feelings before the Zoom host hits record, take stock of how often your discussions and warm-up banter feel void of any real meaning or interest. Stop asking questions where you don't even care to know the answer. Start answering questions that offer a tiny insight into you.

I’ll start. I’m Kerry. As always, I am trying to prioritize my writing but finding myself with a full client load, so I guess I can't complain. The lack of hefty snow this past season has me worried about upcoming ski seasons. I'm in NY now but recently worked from the West Coast, but how I really got here, to this newsletter, was deciding 5 years ago that I had a bigger life in me, with more opportunities and experiences to uncover. Here I am, exploring everything and anything.

How is your month going?