Tale Of The Tongue

People talk about being “tongue-tied”, using the term to describe how one can stumble over words like loose bricks in a sidewalk. For most, this is a temporary condition. Clear your head. Start over. Move on.

For me, it’s a permanent condition that I have to be mindful about every day.

The lingual frenulum is the piece of skin that connects your tongue to the bottom of your mouth. Sometimes, this skin is too thick, or far forward, and can limit the tongue’s movement. It’s easily corrected at birth, if the doctor determines that it could be a problem, and a frenotomy can be performed by dentists during a regular visit.

This is all fairly recently-acquired news and I’m not sure what to think about it. Growing up, I always felt “mush-mouthed” when talking, and people would often have to ask me to repeat things. Couple that together with ADHD and it’s a recipe for unintelligible and excitable disaster.

So, I’ve learned, over the years, to be very deliberate in my speech. Slow it down, crisp it up, draw it out, find rhythmic tricks for multi-syllabic words. My tongue can barely extend past my teeth and I can’t roll my Rs. I recall that even making out in high school was painful (which didn’t prove to be a problem when I graduated because you learn, in time, to not use so much tongue.)

Now, here I am in my early 50s, reading about ankyloglossia and how it can contribute to sleep apnea (which I have) and can be corrected with a quick out-patient surgery.

And the question arises: what then?

My tongue’s been on a leash for half a millennia and I’m suddenly gonna let it free? What if it goes rogue? “The Tongue From Another Time”. It may, or may not cure the apnea, but how will it effect my speaking and singing? It isn’t like once you snip it, you can just re-attach it if things go orally sideways.

Then again, for once, I’d like to be able to say “Rrrrrico. Suave” and not sound like a gringo. Or do a quick impersonation of Gene Simmons and not look like I’m phoning it in. Or actually get a snowflake to land on my tongue without having to point my mouth straight up to the sky like a turkey.

It’s Halloween and this is what I’m thinking about, at least briefly. It might be the scariest thing that I think of all day, and for that, I am thankful (see what I did there?)