Note: I wrote this a really really long time ago... in 2005 for a class assignment... so excuse the immaturity if any
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To me silence is threatening...
Before every storm there is stillness and silence in the atmosphere. Every animal can smell it but humans can tell it.
It is always silent in the dead of the night. This is the time when thieves think best to raid venturing people in the streets. A dead man says nothing and is silent as people bury him. In a funeral people silently pray for the departing person. When a person wants silence it must be because he or she is sad. Remember, both silent and sad begin with the word ‘S’.
People say “How can a person stay silent forever?” When they know that the other is upset about something.
This is true. A person’s emotions always make the best of him and he can never stay silent.
There is noise everywhere. There is the jungle music in the jungle, the buzzing of busy bees, the chattering of a lady and the busy streets of the city, the list goes on and on. A human is filled with joy when he or she hears the voice of a companion. A mother, at the time of birth giving is never happy about silence.
As a child, I remember I used to put on music before sleep because I could not stand the silence before bedtime. I would not be afraid of the creaking of crickets at night. Instead, I would be afraid of a room without the whirring of the fan, the scrapping against cardboard made by rats and the wonderful sound of my mother.
How can one live in silence? Thinking of it sends chills down my spine. The ghostliness of an empty silent house has no movement inside and no life. A silent house is always targeted to be a haunted house. Silence, in my opinion, signifies lifelessness.
I remember once, when I went to Murree, the place where I was staying had children. But at night, when they were sleeping like little angels, I felt as if something was behind me. It was because of the silence of the house.
I understand that silence is also peaceful but even when the hippie style was ‘in’, I guess that the people who loved silence, must have put on slow and low music in their homes.
A graveyard and my house share the same wall on the side. I dare not look at it whenever I cross it because of the silence. I do wonder how the people, who live in it, tolerate the silence.
What silence is; I do not know. What I do know is that my sixth sense always clicks when it occurs. The big mystery of what silence is will always remain a mystery, just like life itself. It is not a thing, it is not a feeling, nor is it human or an animal or a spirit. Perhaps one day philosophers might figure it out. But I care less. The thing I do not feel is yet a feeling and that I cannot stop. Silence is silence and it will stay like that forever.
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