I love silence. True, solitary silence. Like on a Sunday morning: there’s something unmistakable about the lonely quiet of a Sunday dawn. Every Sunday feels the same – slightly grey, a touch melancholy, yet it warms my heart and soothes my soul.
In these moments, the unnoticed becomes visible. For instance, the two panels of the curtain by the window don’t quite meet. A sliver remains, offering a glimpse outside; rough, untidy, yet the street is laid bare before me. I love that this tiny opening can mean the entire world. From the comfort of my little refuge, I can watch life unfold.
I see, I hear, I feel everything. There is hope. There is a choice. I can decide to be here – or there. In body or spirit, I can be anywhere I want. I can step onto the busy street, weaving between cars and puddles to reach the other side, the rain soaking my freshly washed hair because I forgot my umbrella. I can feel the icy, dirty water splash up to my knees.
Today, I’m in good spirits; I laugh at it, and the people I pass laugh with me. Other Sundays, I move on, crushed, counting each step until I finally reach home. Or I can stay inside, wrapped in a floral robe, bathed in warmth, a mug of coffee in hand. I can watch someone else experience the same thing. Someone who isn’t me, yet could be. Words, like lost travelers, pause on my lips. Hesitating, unsure where to go next. I help them. They gather themselves and set out across the bridge of my tongue, up my throat, over the steep ridge of my neck, to arrive gloriously among my thoughts. Here, words belong. Wedged into the dense mounds of unspoken imagination. One by one, side by side, creating a whole – every thought, every fragment of me.
I love silence because in it, I am truly myself. There are no expected questions or rehearsed answers, no smiles or frowns. No one sees, no one hears. Only the flow of everything that lives inside me – everything that has happened, everything that will happen, even what may never happen. Imagination becomes reality: sitting in one place, I can be everywhere – on a muddy street in the rain, or by sparkling waves under the blazing sun. Or nowhere at all. I call forth images of the past, preserved in my heart. Layered carefully, stacked with care.
I place one image atop another, aligning edges and corners precisely. They do not wrinkle, do not gather dust. I spread them out, I search. I project them through the narrow curtain gap, onto the windowpane, radiating from my retina. I flip through them. I remember. When I am full, I close my eyes and everything goes dark. I see nothing, the images vanish. I put them all away, each back into its proper place.
I do not open my eyes. Not yet. For now, I am truly myself. Thoughts do not rush; they do not chase one another. They speak to me softly, attentively. I lean back on the sofa, resting my head lightly. I still hold the mug, to keep from drifting off. The thoughts whisper for a few more minutes, fainter, shorter. Their last words barely breathe before silence falls again. I open my eyes. I look, but see nothing. Slowly, the image clears, and I sit up again.
The gap remains, along with the heartwarming, peaceful melancholy and greyness. I take one last sip, set the mug on the table, glance at the gap once more – my little slice of the world. I commit this frame to memory, placing it atop the images of the past. Another Sunday, I will see it again. I turn my head, bidding farewell to my reverie.
I look around the apartment and smile. Earthly things must still be tended to. Silence lingers. I am the one to break it. I rise from the sofa. In a week, the reverie will wait for me again, along with the gap between my curtains. Until then, the power of silence will remain with me.
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