“Silence, something about silence makes me sick,
‘Cos silence can be violent sorta like a slit wrist…”
So sang Zack de La Rocha of Rage Against the Machine. I can’t say I agree. Having spent most of my adult life wanting to listen to music or the radio or to at least have some sort of background hum recently I’ve started appreciating peace and quiet, and even silence.
We live on a fairly quiet suburban street on the edge of a reasonably sized town – but it ‘s surprising how quiet it can be. It struck me once when in the garden a few years back. I stopped for a second and could hear pretty much nothing. No road noise, no trains (we’ve a line across the bottom of the garden, but it’s not a busy one) and just the occasional snatch of birdsong. It was quite calming and I almost felt.. relaxed.
Having small children means silence is a luxury – I tend only to get it now just after I’ve woken up, and just before the little ones do. But are there any other fans of silence on here? And do you find it calming or irritating?
I generally find it irritating. To me, it’s the sound of missing out on some music. Having said that, when sitting in the garden there are three things worse than silence.
1. Next door’s wind chimes! – There should be a law against it.
2. The distant sound of trail bikes over revving
3. Bloody birds.
I miss silence. Like many others here I have paid for my love of music with tinnitus, and a lot of the time need some background noise to distract from it. If I stop to contemplate silence it instantly makes me aware of the high pitched whine in my ears.
I do appreciate a calm environment though, and one of the things I most love about my flat is that it overlooks a small play-park at the end of a group of cul-de-sacs, so there is no passing traffic and even the kids aren’t right underneath the window. I had to have words with the new neighbours downstairs a week or two back about bass heavy music on a Sunday morning. I’m not a man who thrives on confrontation but after an hour it was clear they weren’t going to stop of their own accord, and I guess that something in my eye told them that I wasn’t to be messed with when it came to relaxing in my own home. I haven’t heard a peep out of them since.
There’s really no such thing, though, is there ? I don’t mean to be pedantic, and yes, I am a big fan of that quiet space where you can just hear life, nature, the buzzing, chirruping, breezing, lapping, rippling and sometimes distant life pleasure on the quiet horizon, like children playing, dogs barking, bells ringing…
Antarctica? I’d move there if it wasn’t for the cold and six months of total darkness. Otherwise ace. I love silence, possibly obsessively so. My home in Spain is in the middle of nowhere – with no neighbours in sight – and I am spoilt for silence. Although given that Spain is the noisiest country in Europe (and officially the second noisiest in the world, after Japan) there will always be someone else’s barking dogs in the distance to disturb the peace.
I was told by someone who met John Cage a few time that his “silent” 4 33 piece was written to make people realise that there was no such thing as silence. And more specifically, as it was first performed in a small building surrounded by the countryside, to make people aware of the kind of natural sounds you’ve listed.
On the other hand, my friend also told me that Cage had a strong element of the fairground huckster about him, and knew how to get his name known with a deliberate piece of paradox and provocation – like so many of the avant-garde in all areas of the arts.
No, I think you’re right there Rob – I’m over-selling peace as silence. Incidentally, my wife would raise an eyebrow if she read my OP – she’s always amazed by me not being able to cook or do something without the radio on. I like having background noise occasionally, it’s just that sometimes nothing or near nothing is quite soothing.
Since my wife got this brain tumour, I miss her voice that got replaced by a robotic one, on the other side, we had so many different women that came here for help, that it is hard to keep the sound low.
Because of that, I came to appreciate the complete silence from human voices that I need so much to read a book.
Many people in Sweden tend to speak rather loud and a lot, even when they are in the tube or in the bus and as quick as someone speak louder, they adapt their voices according to it, to be heard. It’s sometimes impossible to read a single sentence in the tube.
That’s why I appreciate the Alvaret landscape on Öland, where the only sounds to be heard comes from the animals, the wind or the movement of my blood.
Then I put on some music.
I hope your wife is doing well. Sounds as though she’s got a very supportive network helping her.
She stays at the hospital this evening for tests. In Sweden, citizens has the right to get some help payed if they get handicapped, that makes life a bit easier. Anyhow, she learnt to appreciate silence as well, we need to reduce the brain stimulation sometimes to let it cure itself.
Silence is a much sought after commodity.
Being quite lazy, most working days are pretty hectic – get up, get out in the shortest time possible.
Work – never ending noise
Come Home – Conversation, Music, TV
Endless days full of noise
Weekends though – commencing Friday night, there is nothing I like more than sitting quietly with a beverage of my choice when Mrs D has gone up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire.
This is repeated on a Saturday Morning, with copious coffee and cigarettes, before the inmates are woken by my latest choice of music.
Repeat for a Sunday.
Oh yes, the snatched moments of silence or truly a gift that I thoroughly look forward to
As is often the case…Depeche Mode have just the song.
This is a very entertaining live clip. Lots going on here – not just the full Fletch waving and clapping experience but also HPSaucecraft’s teenage crush Peter Gordeno!
It takes the noise of UK to fully realise the relative silence. Tonight, here in deepest Languedoc, there seem so few humans around it is wonderful soaking in the sound of birds and bees. It is a small village and there are people here, but you wouldn’t know it. And driving on empty roads without a CD is so refreshing.
If you love silence, I can warmly recommend a visit to Stockholm on Midsummer Eve. There is an enormous exodus of people heading out to celebrate this biggest of Swedish holidays in the countryside. So the city is like a ghost town.
We stayed at home when the kids were small for Midsummer. We live in a very quiet suburb but even so the difference in the level of ambient noise was very striking. A bit spooky to realise how much noise we were used to hearing from traffic, the Metro etc that wasn’t there any more.
A number of years ago on a walking holiday in the Lake District, I got up very early one morning, drove to Seathwaite and set off on my own for Green Gable. It was a beautiful day in June or July and I can remember the splendour of being alone in the most beautiful, peaceful and utterly silent location. I’m not a particularly spiritual person, but it was a very special moment that I haven’t forgotten, despite many other similar walks in many different places. It was just the total silence that got to me, like being wrapped in a protective blanket, eerie yet completely comforting.
On a much more prosaic note, when I am sitting in my garden on a lazy sunny Sunday, trying to read my book, drink my coffee and soak it all in, and all I can hear is relentless drilling, lawn mowing, hammering, pressure washing and shouting, I’d be quite happy for an EU directive on silence. Too late now.
I grew up being quite familiar with silence, as Quakers sit for an hour of shared silence (with spontaneous spoken ministry occasionally breaking the quiet) each Sunday.
This discipline, this shared fellowship, this glimpse into an ocean of mysticism is deeply sustaining.
Beautiful. Have an up, Saldude.