“When was your last really good conversation?”

I think back. A few weeks ago, over a convivial dinner table – and another some weeks earlier. Infrequent – but why? Is any pleasure preferable? Why not often?

I dispatch my curiosity to explore. The glory of not knowing, of fumbling in the murk for sense! Like Sherlock’s, my brain mopes unbridled. His favored whodunnits, mine whydunnits.

Noise is partly to blame. Quiet is conversation’s precondition: who can muse in a roar? Combustion engines, electronic voices, automatic beeps, online yapping despoil our calm. Just now, into my sanctum, a radio song, buzz saw, and truck shriek coil; I can barely make out the plink of Jane’s spoon against her breakfast bowl next door. Each intrusive noise nibbles a crumb of concentration until, some days, scant remains. Even deep in the woods one hears jets and the hiss of distant tires.

To dodge tedium, we cram our ears with entertainment. Me too. I love my recorded books and limitless musical choices. My gluttonous brain would gobble podcasts too, but who has time. Most conversation is weak tea compared to this rich fare. I must remove my earpiece to hear what even Jane is telling me.

Untrained, we lose the knack for conversation. To play any game, one must know the rudiments. To converse, one needs to listen, take turns, ingratiate, enjoy (or at least, endure) dissent. One must cheerfully accept the frustration of not being heard. These social arts must be taught and practiced. Easier to bury one’s attention in emails or incessant TV.

Add risk-aversion to the list of conversational obstacles. How easily disagreement slip-slides to debate, then quarreling, driving a pleasant activity to acrimony. The Gotcha avidity of talking heads compounds the danger of speaking one’s mind. Where I dread being misunderstood, I button my lips, preferring to consign my thoughts to the page, where I exert better control.

Sincerity is another missing ingredient of conversation. Conversing with a liar makes me a dupe, dope, or both. Why anyone listens to Trump is beyond me. He doesn’t mean what he says, his fans shrug. What, then, does he mean!

“My idea of good company is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation,” wrote Jane Austen. Her novels sparkle with articulation: even the odious are well-spoken. Such elegant exchanges would be incredible in contemporary fiction, where grunts, sighs, groans, and ellipses convey our mental miasma.

The decline of conversation coincides with the rise of boorishness in America. Aren’t you gobsmacked by how vilely various public figures behave? They should be spanked, sent to their rooms, their mouths rinsed with soap. Do they cringe to observe themselves?

Onlookers bemoan the collapse of comity in today’s America. Neither side can hear the other, we’re told, as if both sides were at fault.

I disclaim responsibility for the collapse of our national conversation. For a decade, I’ve been trying to fathom what we’re being told. You can hear my missives tearing their hair. Instead of a reasonable recital of political differences or suggestions for bettering America, we’re dowsed with grievances, insults, conspiracy theories, lies and nonsense (post-birth abortions? eating cats?), the petulant pout of pubescents. Yes, it takes two to tangle, but muggers and their victims are not equally to blame.

The less we converse, the more we must rely on force to keep the peace. Civilization depends on civility. The less we converse, the less we comprehend each other’s outlook. Today’s America seems to be spiraling into a lonely lunacy. We should talk about it – if only we knew how.