I always defined myself in terms of my talkativeness, and being without a voice hits me in a number of ways.
Most of the time, I'm not scared. I get on with life, not because I'm a fatalist, but because that's the most congenial way of dealing with things. Indeed, most of the time, I'm not conscious of dealing with anything.
People assume that death hanging over my head would allow me to put things into perspective, but that's not how it works.
