Voices

I'm pretty good at recognizing voices. Answering the phone as a kid I could respond to any of my Mom's friends by name within a few syllables. I can still pick out friends and former associates on radio and TV... And every once in a while I hear a voice I don't know at all, but wish I did.

For example, Kate Hodge, the actress whose smoky barefoot breathiness can be experienced on Citracal commercials.

She reminds me of a similar sounding caller to my radio station in Seattle more than 15 years ago. I never learned her name, but the very sound of her burned into my brain as I asked if she was deliberately trying to melt my shorts. She might have moved north to Bellingham, because I could swear I heard her call the Car Talk guys from there.

Back on Cape Cod, I wasn't home when my Mom answered a call from a woman I'd known briefly as a teenager. Mom said she sounded nice, and I wasn't surprised because that's how I remembered her, and why I wanted to reconnect after living away from home for many years.

But it wasn't until recently that I finally heard her as an adult and realized Mom could very well have thought she sounded nice because, once my friend reached adulthood, they sounded very much alike!

Eargasms are a funny thing... Very personal and not necessarily limited to one particular sound. I don't really have a type, but sometimes I just have a visceral reaction. And every so often I find myself wishing that someone sounding sweet would tell me my car was ready... Or someone sultry would alter my bone density.