Voice: Lessons from the Universe

At the end of last year you may recall the reveal of my word for 2024–this was to be the Year of Voice. My intentions were to focus on two aspects of voice: (a) speaking more Turkish and (b) using my authorial voice (doing more writing). My summer plans included staying in a more remote location to do personal writing as well as forcing myself to be amongst villager Turks who speak less English causing me to speak more Turkish. You can read the original post here. That was the plan.

In a famous poem by Robert Burns is this often referenced line: “The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” This is what happened to my Year of Voice–it was hijacked, and things went awry in surprising and unexpected ways. While I wasn’t cognizant of all the ways that voice could manifest in life, this year has taught me two important new ways to think about voice. Let me explain.

You may have read the post about my travel to Colombia earlier this year and the unfortunate thing that happened to us while we were there. In that robbery my iPhone 12 was stolen. I spent more than one week without a phone, as I had to get back to Türkiye before I could purchase a replacement. Thankfully, Kyla had an old iPhone 7 which I used while on wifi for some communications. But it is nearly impossible to exist in this world without a phone number! Take a moment and think about ALL the apps and sites that require secondary authentication (OTP or SMS codes). Without an active phone number I felt handicapped and disconnected; I could not access my WhatsApp account and that has become THE primary communication tool in my life–both for personal and professional realms.

Our phones are an extension of our bodily voice. We use our phones to speak with people, and also to interact with communication apps such as WhatsApp, Signal, WeChat, Telegram, and to post to and get information from various social media platforms–Instagram, Facebook, etc. I learned the necessity of phones as an extension of voice. It was a humbling time, not to mention expensive. Electronics in Türkiye are often double the cost, or more. For example: I purchased an iPhone 15 in February when I returned. I paid 58,601 TL which was about 1,890 USD. I don’t know how much the cost of the same iPhone would have changed in the USA (but surely not by much)–the current cost is 799 USD. Significant difference, no??

It used to be that you could bring a phone purchased outside of Türkiye and then pay to register that phone at the tax office. But the government here has made this cost prohibitive. The current cost to register an outside phone is currently 31,692 TL (932 USD), and will increase to 45,614 TL (1,341 USD) in January. (When I arrived in 2018 it was maybe 150 USD.)

Lesson 1: Phones are a critical component of our voices–the ability to send our voices out into the world and to connect with those we love.

My second twist on the meaning of voice was unexpected. I am not going to recount the full story just yet (at some point in the future I may feel inclined to share a detailed accounting of the event).

In early May of this year I was walking to a friend’s house for dinner. On that walk I was physically assaulted in the street by my boyfriend’s ex-wife. In that assault my phone was damaged and I had to send it off to Istanbul for a week to be repaired (cost was 12,000 TL, 360 USD). This meant I had to get a second hand phone to “live life” for that week (again–think about all the apps that require a phone–banking, etc). I won’t bother to talk about the cost of that phone–I have a backup on hand now. Here we have an echo of Lesson 1–the necessity of a phone to exist and have voice in this modern world.

But there is a secondary realization, one way more powerful in meaning, from this episode.

I am still waiting to see if there will be charges filed against the woman who assaulted me (the Turkish legal system is EXTREMELY slow moving) by the public prosecutor. In the meantime I decided it would be wise to file a restraining order against her. I engaged lawyers and there has been a restraining order in place since the end of May. I won’t bother with details here but needless to say this was also costly.

Lawyers in Türkiye do not operate hourly, but rather you pay a set fee for the type of case that will occur. I have paid my lawyers most of the fee–but will wait to see if a case will occur or not. The court has decided there isn’t enough evidence to pursue a property damage case (I don’t see how, but so it goes 🤷🏻‍♀️). This assailant does not work (full time stay-at-home mother) and any money I would recoup from her would come from either her family or her ex-husband (my boyfriend, and YES they have been divorced for more than four years).

Money is not my wish for retribution anyway. I would like to hear her acknowledge/own that what she did was wrong and thoroughly uncalled for (I mean, she divorced him for goodness sake!).  It is NOT okay to assault a person in the street unprovoked (it was our first, and only, face-to-face encounter). But for now I wait. What is the lesson here, you ask?

This reality made me aware that it is expensive to afford a legal voice. My situation is nothing when I stop to reflect and think about ALL the women in the world (and I’m sure some men too) who find themselves in abusive relationships who cannot afford to hire a lawyer and make their LEGAL VOICE heard in a court of law. Sadly, too many people stay in households with domestic violence because they first cannot afford to leave and get to safety. But secondarily, they can’t afford to pursue holding their perpetrators accountable for the abuse. It was shocking and humbling to arrive at this sad realization. In the grand scheme of things my assault was a one-off and I am not so much traumatized by it. But it did teach me a new angle of voice.

Lesson 2: Not everyone can afford a legal voice.

I can’t say my Turkish has improved greatly this year. I continue to participate in online lessons for two hours each week. I do find myself being able to read more signs and documents. Fatih and I are still together (14 months now) which means I am often listening to Turkish and taking it in. I will soon hit a 100 day streak on Duolingo. But I know I need to push myself to SPEAK more. I am lazy in this department.

I also have not done much writing this year. My summer rental also went awry and I wasn’t able to stay in the village as I had planned. This post will only be my 7th one on the blog for this calendar year. I would prefer to publish monthly. My journaling has also diminished. As you can see my intentions for Voice did not come to pass. I am disappointed about this. However, as I have learned with words in previous years (example, Provoke in 2020), sometimes the Universe has an alternate awareness for us to gain. That was the case for me this year–not all is lost, just a change in the gain. I now value the importance of our phones as an extension of our self, and I am grateful that I am in a financial position to afford a legal voice.

As for the word for 2025–I have only begun to think about it. I have a month to reflect on the current year and consider what I am hoping to manifest and focus on for the coming year. Until then, if you have any thoughts or comments on my sharing, please feel free to comment below.

And Happy Holidays Everyone!

P.S. I AM enjoying speaking with my newly formed English Speaking Club (picture below) with some of my Turkish colleagues from ACI. It DOES allow me to practice Turkish too!