The only time I ever experienced true silence was the night I spent with my friends in the country. I guess I was about ten years old because it made quite an impression on me. I was laying there awake, straining my ear for any sound at all, finding none. Suddenly, I was overwhelmed at the nothingness. It seemed to be screaming at me! I don’t know whether my mind was inventing an ominous sound because it didn’t know what else to do, or whether my ears actually started ringing. But my silence-sound wasn’t high pitched, it was low and buzz-like. And it wouldn’t go away! The silence was so loud that I couldn’t go to sleep…
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I love the silence of the country life, or should I say silent from man made noises. The chirping of crickets & croaking tree frogs are a tired souls lullaby. God himself would have to command me to move back into a city where you look out your window only to see other houses. I don’t feel nothingness in the silence, I feel closer to Him = )
The strangest thing… I didn’t hear any tree frogs or crickets that night. Perhaps it was winter time; I don’t remember. We grew up with the highway in view from our backyard, so maybe that’s why I was a little freaked out by the silence. I haven’t experienced complete silence since – I don’t believe. My husband must sleep with the fan on, even in thunderstorms…
😦
I stayed a few nights at my great-grandfather’s home down in Mississippi country, once. The night *did* sound different — silent, save for crickets. And it was darker, away from all the streetlights. It smelled different there, too; earthier, like foreign, fragrant dirt.
I have a lot of great memories from that trip — the smell, among them.
Funny how the experience was different in almost every way: sight, smell, sound.
I’m trying to imagine a location that would have felt and tasted different as well. Perhaps if you had any relatives that were mermaids…