I Cannot Unhear the "Ing" 🙉

I have noticed something about the way other people talk. It is small. It should not bother me. It bothers me.

They enunciate the "ing."

Not all of them. But enough of them. Enough that I hear it everywhere now and cannot stop hearing it. Someone says "writing" and they hit that "ing" like it owes them money. Wri-ting. With a hard g and everything. The "ing" gets its own little moment, its own little stage, like it is the star of the word and the rest of the syllables are just backup dancers.

I do not know why this irritates me. That is the honest truth. I have tried to figure it out. I sit there and I listen to someone say "running" or "going" or "thinking" and they give that "ing" so much energy and I feel my jaw tighten and I do not know why. It is a sound. It is a normal sound. People are allowed to pronounce words correctly. That is the whole point of words.

But here we are.

I think part of it is that it sounds performative. Like the person is trying very hard to speak well. Like they took a class. Like somewhere along the way a teacher told them to pronounce their endings clearly and they took it to heart and now they cannot stop. Every "ing" is a little announcement. Every "ing" says, "I am a person who speaks properly." And I am over here just trying to have a conversation and being ambushed by consonants.

Writing. Wri-ting. Running. Run-ning. Thinking. Think-ing. It is like every word gets a tiny drumroll at the end.

I tried to ask a friend about it once. I said, "Does it bother you when people really hit the 'ing' in words?" And she looked at me like I was insane. She said, "What do you mean?" And I tried to demonstrate and I could not do it without sounding like I was doing a bit. Because the thing is, when you try to imitate it, it sounds like a joke. It sounds like a character. Nobody thinks they are doing it. That is the worst part. They think they are just talking.

I have started noticing other things now. I cannot un-notice them. People who say "literally" too much. People who clear their throat before every sentence. People who say "right?" at the end of statements like they need permission. The "ing" people are just the loudest of a whole chorus of small annoyances that live in my head rent free.

I know I am the problem here. I know that. A normal person hears someone say "writing" and thinks nothing of it. I hear someone say "writing" and I am suddenly composing a whole essay in my head about phonetics and social class and the psychology of speech. I am exhausted by my own brain.

And yet.

Here I am. Writing about it. Wri-ting about it. With the "ing" fully intact and fully pronounced because what else am I going to do. I am not going to become one of those people who swallows their endings. That is a different kind of awful. That is how you end up saying "writin" and sounding like you are texting with your thumbs.

So I will keep saying "writing" the normal way and I will keep being irritated by the people who say it the other normal way and we will all just live our lives. This is the deal. This is the contract. I am not happy about it but I am accepting it.

I am not mad at the "ing" people. I am mad at the "ing." The "ing" is the villain. They are just its vehicle. I am sure they are lovely. I am sure they are wonderful conversationalists. I just need to acknowledge that somewhere, in a room, a man is flinching every time they say "going."

That is all. That is the whole thing. I am going to go now. Going. Going. Going.