The beach vs the mall

I'm beginning to prepare for vacation.  We're headed to the Outer Banks for a week.  I love it there.  The air feels different.  There are broad expanses with no buildings, no people, no civilization.  We will be staying in Avon at the edge of one of the parks, so we'll have 17 miles of sandy beach to walk on should the spirit so move us.  Rarely do we see any people walking along there at this time of year.  It's perfect for silence and deep thinking (as long as the waves crashing don't count as noise!)

In contrast to being at the beach, Chris and I went to the mall yesterday.  It was the first time in over 15 years I'd been to a mall, so it was quite an experience.  (Remember, I told you I'm weird!)  It was such a stimulating experience.  First of all, there was no silence to be had.  The sounds of voices echoed throughout the cavernous space whenever we weren't in a store.  In the stores, there was always loud music blaring.  Visually there was so much to see and to process, it was overwhelming.  We were looking for a pair of shoes for Chris.  He wears size 14.  We'd already been to 4 stores along Midlothian Turnpike, but none of them had anything his size that would fit his feet well.  That was why we decided to brave the Mall.  For three hours we trudged through the packed hallways (hard to believe we're in a recession given how many people were there) looking for black casual leather shoes for narrow feet in size 14.  I think we went to 15 stores.  Eventually we were pulled into the Sleep Number Mattress Store.  That one looked too inviting to pass up!  We lay on the beds one by one and were hypnotized by the very nice saleswoman's pitch about how the beds are made and why.  Chris was very interested in buying one, even though they cost about $2000 just for the mattress.  I told the saleswoman we'd give it some thought and would let her know.  I knew I needed to get him out of there!  They were interesting mattresses and might be helpful for the back pain I've been experiencing for the last year, but I am not ready to spend $2000 for one! 

When we walked out of the store and compared notes, Chris asked me, "How does your back feel?"  I told him it was feeling strained and sore.  He said his was too!  So much for the mattress!  He said he figured we could sort it out so it would be just right.  I feel skeptical.  It was a very good sales pitch though.

Eating at the food court was another experience.  Such a din!  Dinner was fine - teriyaki chicken.  I was thankful for the water.  I tend to get dehydrated when I shop in Malls so needed water badly.  So many people there with their kids crying; teens hanging out, trying to impress each other; couples wandering around; kids ready to go home NOW.  Not much interaction between people other than those already together.  And noise.  And sights and sounds.

A few more stores so we'd been to all of them to find the darn shoes. We stumbled into Sears like survivors onto an island.  We looked at the Lands End area.  Chris found some khakis and shorts for ridiculously good prices.  I bought a winter coat I'd been looking at in their catalogue all winter long - 75% off.  After 3 hours, we'd finally pried open our wallets.

We heaved up our bags and walked wearily to the car which we finally found after pushing the lock/unlock button enough times that we could locate it by sound.  Too hard to remember where it was parked after all that time.

It was a relief to get into the car, a hybrid, with no motor noises, in the dark, and be quiet together as we rode home.  The silence of our home on the cul-de-sac was so welcome.  We are open to the possibility of becoming hermits.  We appreciate simplicity and silence and open space and sparse surroundings.  We love our friends and family and don't really want to be recluses, but it is such a jolt to be confronted by so much excess in a Mall.  Wow.

On the beauty of Silence

Many people consider me very strange - that may come as no surprise to those of you who read this blog regularly - but at any rate...  what I'm referring to this time is that I love silence.  2-3 times/year I go on a retreat where I don't speak for days at a time.  I would go  more often if I could.

The first time I went, I was terrified.  I told my friend I was going with I didn't know how I would deal with not talking that whole time.  I think I was afraid to be alone with my thoughts for that long.

What ended up happening was that I fell in love - with myself, with silence, with all of Creation.  I took the time to walk quietly through Nature and to see what miracles are all around me.  I took these photos which are quite different from anything I take in my "normal" life when I'm rushing to get places and do things.  I remember feeling so happy I could hardly contain myself.  I was exuberant.

Ever since then, whenever I can, I go to be in the silence.

The article below was sent to me by a friend and describes her experience with Silence quite beautifully.  I wish you much joy from reading it.

The Devil Loves Cell Phones


Silence isn't just golden—it's heavenly.

By Julia Baird
NEWSWEEK

Published Oct 22, 2009
From the magazine issue dated Nov 2, 2009

It's not hard to imagine hell as a place that is very, very noisy. In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis's Devil detests music and silence. Hell, he crowed, was filled with furious noise: "the audible expression of all that is exultant, ruthless and virile…We will make the whole universe a noise…We have already made great strides in this direction as regards the Earth. The melodies and silences of Heaven will be shouted down in the end."

In the Middle Ages, Christian scholars believed that Satan did not want human beings to be alone with God, or with each other, fully alert and listening. This is why British author Sara Maitland believes the mobile phone is a "major breakthrough for the powers of hell." Maitland is more conscious of noise than most—she spent more than a decade pursuing silence like a hunter its prey. She writes in A Book of Silence, just published in the U.S., how she traveled to the desert, the hills, and the remote Scottish Highlands because she wanted to discover what silence truly was, and immerse herself in it. "I am convinced that as a whole society we are losing something precious in our increasingly silence-avoiding culture," she writes, "and that somehow, whatever this silence might be, it needs holding, nourishing and unpacking."

After spending 40 days in an isolated house on a windy moor, Maitland found silence did several things: her physical sensations were heightened (she was overwhelmed by the deliciousness of porridge, heard different notes in the wind, was more sensitive to temperature, and emotional); she became what she calls "disinhibited" (a Jungian notion that once alone, you are free to do what you want—picking your nose while eating, stripping your clothes off, abandoning grooming, washing once a week); she heard voices (a young girl, then a male choir singing in Latin, which she thinks may have been the wind); experienced great happiness; felt connected with the cosmos; was exhilarated by the risk and peril in what she was doing; and discovered a fierce joy, or bliss.

It is a strikingly refreshing book to read, in the midst of the clamor and din, ever-mounting distraction, yelling TV pundits, solipsistic tweet-ing, and flash-card sentiment of our Internet age. It made me realize what a profound longing many of us have for silence, how hard it is to find, and how easily we forget how much we need it. Most snatch it in small grabs—hot baths, long runs, lap swimming, bike rides. Maitland rails against the idea of silence as void, absence, and lack—something that we must rush to fill—insisting it is positive and nurturing, and something more profound that must be actively sought. (When silence is imposed, of course, it is something entirely different.)

What's interesting about silence is not just the extremism, often merging on madness, of those who can claim to have lived silently: the Arctic explorer, the deep-sea diver, the sailor, the hermit, the ascetic, the nun. What is also important is what the rest of us can wring from the more mundane moments of stillness. We can't all skip around nude through the Scottish bracken, or inhabit caves in Tibetan mountains, but we can experience silence in ways so potent they become addictive: the magical quiet of swimming under the sea; the uninterrupted hours after midnight; the sweet intimacy between a mother and her baby, being nursed in the wee hours; the breathless stillness after excellent sex; the hush of awe while gazing at a proud, ancient mountain, a huge rock glowing red in the desert, or someone soaring down a 20-foot wave. Even if it is not pure silence, it can be enough. We may not all have visions of a spinning, shining, silent God as Maitland does, but, as our thoughts are stripped back and stilled, we might sense the mystery of something greater than ourselves.

We often talk about distraction, and the banality of a culture that seems to smother deep thought or time-sucking contemplation—we tweet sneezes, we blink and record it for our friends, we sprint to be the first to speak. The anonymity of the Internet has been replaced by hyper-identity; the idea of shutting up and staring at a rock, piles of sand, or blinking stars for hours, if not weeks, seems profoundly countercultural.

I know, it sounds like the lament of the Luddite. But if generations of mystics and seekers have insisted that there's something that connects silence with the sublime, you have to wonder what we are distracting ourselves from—and who we could be if, every now and then, we paused.