Quiet engulfs so much of my days now. It's the kind of quiet where speech doesn't exist except from the canned sound of a TV or radio. The cats meow. I answer. The maintenance guy arrives, checks off his duty and leaves. My trail walk consists of nods to others but words...no.
It's a quiet I remember from childhood. The long days in rural Kentucky were quiet even with others. We didn't have such long and detailed conversations as people do now. Instead, I remember companionship with my brothers breaking into arguments leading to more quiet. Three channels of TV with only two audible meant it was turned off more than on....
Traffic on the nearby road was scant enough that my grandparents made note of whoever they observed driving. We rocked on the glider in between chores or during them. Beans breaking, strawberries being hulled, apples peeling...quiet work.
Listening tonight to the rain sliding from the tiled roof, the window being tapped with heavy droplets, I experience sound but in such a quiet way.
A dear one reminded me recently of how important external quiet is to help calm internal cacophony. By turning toward my old friend of silence, I've turned on my creative volume.
My voice is sliding from me now onto the page, spilling like the rain and tapping my brain with droplets...loud, energetic and very unquiet voices.
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