Message received

I got a plaintive note yesterday, from a remote EFL owner:

“Commish, please … I have very little news, the commish’s posts are my main sports page, so bless him.”

Read that carefully.  First the author pleads with the “Commish.”  Clearly, the author is under stress. He writes hastily, abbreviating the proper title  “Commissioner” even though he comes with a plea.

Second, he has a dire need:  he is starving for news.

Third, he cannot focus on his audience. He cannot tell if the “Commish” hears him. He casts about frantically for someone, anyone, who might pay attention to his pleas. He begins to address someone other than the Commish. He doesn’t identify this other person. In fact, he creates the distinct impression there is no other person. He has given up on addressing the Commish.  He has almost given up on getting anyone to listen. He is now just praying, broadcasting his appeal to the world, just in case someone happens to hear him.

And what is this last desperate message? First, that the Commish’s daily posts are his last source of news, his last indication that the world is still out there,  it might yet include him —  there might be someone to rescue him from his isolation from all he holds dear.

This is the plea of a man trapped in a mine after the exit has caved in. He’s a thousand feet down, in the dark, tapping on a pipe (i.e.,  the transactions page), hoping against hope someone will hear, and will care enough to take his message to the Commissioner.

But then comes the most remarkable part of this entire plea: our lost man does not ask for rescue. He doesn’t ask for a reply, nor even another post.

He asks his unknown, merely hoped-for listener to bless the Commissioner.

I mentioned Phil’s concept of “performative speech” the other day. I’ve been reading more about it in Fail Better: Why Baseball Matters, the Mark Kingwell book Melanie gave me.  Kingwell is a wordy philosopher, willing to stretch like a gutted deer to reach for philosophy while trying to keep a foot on first base.

I don’t think our isolated correspondent is using performative speech when he says “bless him.”  If it was performative, no one would have to hear it. So what is it when the speech has the desired effect upon being heard?  Perhaps we could call it “performative communication” or maybe just “performative listening.”  But those terms seem to underemphasize what the isolated correspondent has accomplished.

Sitting at the bottom of his dank, dark collapsed coal mine — no, let’s be more hopeful:  in the warm sunshine of his remote Mediterranean isle, our isolated correspondent made a kind of magic when he tapped on the pipe put his note in the bottle and tossed it into the sea.  Let’s call it “generative” speech: speech that flowers into something strong, useful, beautiful, healing, or life-giving when it is received.

Dear News-Starved Colleague:

Generative message gratefully received.

— The Commissioner