Freelancer admits she talks too much

In one of Salon.com's Mortifying Disclosures features, Los Angeles journalist Taffy Brodesser-Akner reveals herself to be a blabbermouth who doesn't listen enough. That's her description, not mine — the features are all about admitting an embarrassing failing. Hers involved pitching a story on Ikea to an editor in a New York coffee shop, only to to discover the pitchee was a stranger.

I have always known I talk too much, because people have always told me. They say, "You talk too much." When they're not feeling kind, they also say things like, "Don't you ever shut up?" A boyfriend once looked over at me during a party, and just when I thought he was going to tell me he loved me, he said, "Can you just shut your mouth? Even for a minute?" We're not together anymore.

I have sensed, as I've gotten older, that my loquaciousness isn't always interpreted as bubbly or enthusiastic, as it was when I was younger. I have sensed that it has become toxic, and certainly annoying. In college, when my roommate and a few friends returned from dinner out, I asked how the evening went. My roommate said, "You wouldn't have liked it. It was really laid back and nice." She wasn't being mean when she said that. I think she didn't think of me, maybe rightfully so, as someone who could enjoy a relaxed evening.

My husband's main complaint about me is that I won't let him finish a sentence. I say it's my excitement for the conversation, my interest in discourse. He says he just wants to get a word in.

Her husband is Claude Brodesser-Akner, New York Magazine's chief scribe in L.A.