Hue Of Silence

Hue Of Silence

Silence eh! It has made its presence felt in my life in many very different ways. Let me take you through some of them and why it is so special to me.

When I was growing up, when my parents took all the decisions in my life, I remember my brother and I once getting enrolled for a christian camp in St. Theresa School. I was in 8th standard, too young to understand what was going on inside and outside my head. We had no friends there and we were all we had. If I remember correctly it was a 3 days camp. I don’t remember the routine too. I just remember few moments very clearly in my head. We were all sleeping by our ages in different classes and I happened to wake up very early on the first morning. Now I’m not talking about a city with a lot of hustle and bustle but a very coy town of Bhopal in 1997. It was so quiet, so so quiet that I could feel my heart beating. I looked outside the window into the deep green forest behind the school and went outside to the balcony and nothing but leaves had gathered enough energy to move. It was the start of the winter for us and temperature was starting to dip. That silence and I saw my brother sleep. I felt love, lots of it. He needed me so much. I still feel that depth inside. I’ve been ever since trying to emulate that feeling but have failed, although I have come close to it. But that was one morning I’ll never forget. There was another in an evening right at the twilight. As I stood in the balcony and looked left from above the market into the horizon, a strange calmness prevailed inside me. I still remember the other boys making a total ruckus inside the classroom behind my back but it couldn’t bother me then. I was lost. I was new.

I was lost when I was travelling alone for the first time to my college in a train. I still remember the Walkman and a few of the songs and their albums. I have travelled so much during and after my engineering years that I’ve lost track of the exact time and the song but yes I definitely remember if it was raining during some of them. Since, it wasn’t exactly the digital age that we revel in now, I had to carry a lot of cassettes in my bag pack and some of those albums were trance. If anyone remembers it, there was a series of trance collection remixed and redone by Sony Music that went by the name – A Trip Of Trance. They came out in volumes 1 to 6 till I followed and I lost count of them after that. In volume 2, was a song Toca’s Miracle by Fragma. It’s still fresh in my head like it happened yesterday. The rain seeping from under the train window and how I just absolutely had to open the window, drench my face in the rain water so I could let some of my tears out and not look unstable to my fellow passengers. I really needed a miracle to pull myself through it all. I was very alone and I couldn’t show it to anyone. I couldn’t look weak. I was anxious.

I remember the hushed silence beneath that tree-lane when my dad and I went to meet his friend in the CSEB colony in Bhilai for we had to look for a room for me to live in. It was a new place, a new phase of life and somehow I felt my weakness pouring out through my sweat and tears. While he sat in the office with his friend, I felt so alone I had to get out and walk. I still had my walkman and the album this time was Significant Other by Limp Bizkit. The song playing was Don’t Go Off Wandering. I was wandering, wandering in that heat on a lonely road, 200 meters back and forth when my dad fetched me. I still remember looking out through the window on the day dad was supposed to leave while I was in college. He looked at me and all I could do was hug him and plead to not go for another day and well I cried too. I dreaded loneliness.

I’ve also tried to manufacture silence. Satyam Computers were in for campus recruitments. By the time, the interviewers announced our results, it was already 11:30 pm. The results were right as we’d expected – they selected me. There was no end to our joy. The smile got glued to my face. But the way I am, I had already started wondering about my future while me and my friend were on my bike headed home. We kept shouting and singing throughout the way for there was no end to our happiness. I was trying to create silence in my head. I was trying to kill all my thoughts with the shouts and abominable singing. I somehow had a feeling that this wasn’t going to last long. I was confused.

Songs have forever been my way of creating silence. I either sing or listen to them but that’s the only time I feel silence. As I write this post, I’m listening to Game Master by Paul Oakenfold. Another song that I’d patronized for the start of every exam. It just gave me the strength and enough violence in my head to do something unthinkable, write something better to someone elses satisfaction. Not many people exist in this world who don’t know my love for songs but what they don’t know is how songs influence me and my head. It’s my cure. It fills me. It calms me. It silences me.

Then came my wife and a new way I felt silence. We’d been having a rather tumultuous time with some situations in our life when we went on a trip to Goa sponsored totally by my brother. Only the two of us can tell, how much we needed that trip, her more so. It was our second day there when we went to Vagator beach. We knew there was something really special about that beach just by the road that led us to it. No rush, no traffic, trees all around and we could smell the sea and hear waves as we approached it only to get beholden by its sight. While I laid down our bags and got down to my bare essentials, she had already made her way into the sea. She kept walking and walked quite far when she sat down in the sand. I got my camera and was quite excited by the view when I saw her crying. She kept crying and I knew what it was. That silence only interrupted by the sea waves and shrieks from some far away kids was what she sought from this trip. Love and responsibility have never been her cup of tea but I could see now how hard she had tried all of her time with me. All negative energy seemed to abandon her and after about 5 minutes she looked at me and smiled. This was my silence. She finally had what she wanted.

Lets check out what others have got for this challenge –

1. WWC: The Sound of Silence | The Crucial Kiwi
2. The Sound of Silence | The Joy of Health Nutrition and Beauty
3. A Silent Hunt. | The Shady Tree
4. Silence Speaks Louder Than Words | Creative Mysteries
5. Silence of the Cat | The Adventures of Cat Madigan
6. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence #writing | Of Glass & Paper
7. The sound of … | How to write a memo
8. Behind the Facade of the Narcissist’s Silent Treatment | An Upturned Soul
9. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence – Breaking the Barrier | humanTriumphant
10. The Painting On The Wall | Midnight Butterfly
11. Weekly Writing Challenge: Silent Screams | NOWHERE TO RUN
12. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | MARGARET ROSE STRINGER
13. The Sound of Silence | 101 Challenges in 1001 Days
14. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | To Breathe is to Write
15. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | Chronicles of an Anglo Swiss
16. Hush me again, I can’t stand it. | May van Reenen
17. it’s haircut day | Musings of a Random Mind
18. My Quest for the Sound of Silence | Schizo Incognito
19. No Curse | scottishmomus
20. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | The Wandering Poet
21. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | tnkerr-Writing Prompts and Practice
22. Weekly Writing Challenge : The sound of silence | Loin de zanzibar
23. Silence between us | Scent of Rina
24. The Mountain and the Apology | Keep It Real Sister
25. Children Say It Like It Is | Not the Family Business!
26. Excruciating Silence | Life Sans God
27. A Vow of Silence? | living my life
28. Silence is the greatest enabler of abuse. | My thoughts on a page.
29. The Sound of Silence | Cafe Reading
30. Weekly Writing Challenge – Silence | Niki’s Thoughts
31. I Answer My Mom | angieinspired
32. The sound of silence | Boulevard Bellerive
33. Hear no evil | Jenna Dee
34. The unbearable sound of silence | Outmanned
35. The Sound of Your Daughter’s Silence | smallandbrown
36. The Grab Bag Empire: The “Silent” Challenge | britzersleigh
37. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | Mirth and Motivation
38. Thought Processing Centre | I’m Drew Llew, how do you do?
39. Keeping Score is the Worst Kind of Habit | Rewriting Your Heartlines
40. My silent battle with Harold | Dianne Gray author
41. a one-sided conversation | memoirs of an unremarkable man
42. Silence is Louder. | TNT
43. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence « the barren page
44. the silent heartbeat | lifeinthedport
45. Salt Eater | field of thorns
46. Clamorous Silence, What A View | Wandering Gypsy Spirit
47. Born into Silence | Running Brook Reflections
48. Silence: Bus Minutiae | WWC | i dont even know what im doing here
49. TURBULENCE: Prelude | mesardonicmesarcastic
50. Weekly Writing Challenge – The Sound of Silence: Where are the Christians of Christ? | The Latest Word
51. The Sound of Silence | The Nameless One
52. The Sound of Silence | Living in the Moment
53. Write, instead of think/talk.. | davidriswanto
54. Stop and Be Still | davidriswanto
55. My Relationship With Silence | misserinterese
56. Silence of the Night | tuckedintoacorner
57. Practicing Silence – The Key to Finding Inner Peace | Vida Manejo
58. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | my random writing zone
59. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | Morrighan’s Muse
60. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | becoming a family
61. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence/ The cost of silence in Ukraine | veryukrainian
62. The Sound Of Silence | farmerfarthing
63. Silence – Another way to show your love ! | Out of reflection
64. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence | I Hope You’re Taking Notes
65. Silence And It’s Lessons | the TEMENOS JOURNAL
66. Silence And It’s Lessons | the TEMENOS JOURNAL
67. DP Challenge Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound Of Silence | Sabethville
68. On Silence | Chasing Yellow
69. The Blog Farm | Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence
70. litter | yi-ching lin photography
71. Break the Silence | Living Dead Girl
72. Anatomy of a Difficult Summer | I’m Supposed to be Doing Something Else Right Now
73. Silencing My Mind | Sentiments of a Working Mom
74. You forgot to say your new job was ‘Back Stabber’ | Blogizing
75. The Sound of Silence | Venti Mocha Moments
76. Coerced into Silence…..(wp weekly prompt) | Daily Observations
77. The 31st of March 1994 – Minneapolis, Minnesota | Forgotten Correspondance
78. BREAKING SILENCE – A Pet Peeve Comes to Light | Donna Gwinnell Lambo-Weidner
79. Listen to Silence | Human Nature Coaching and Development
80. Unceasing Silence | undefined by design
81. Grass, what are you telling me? | The Seeker
82. The Sound of Silence: Twelve Hours Without Media | suzie81’s Blog
83. Weekly Writing Challenge: When Dreams Die Do They Make a Noise? | The Day After
84. There Is Wind [Weekly Writing Challenge] | Thoughts from Elysium
85. Hurtful Silence | Me – Who am I?
86. Scarcity of Silence | Artfully Aspiring
87. DP Challenge Rachel Carlson – Author of ‘Silent Spring’ | Midwestern Plants
88. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence (Tell Me If You Ever Hear A Sound) | THE BLACK SPAGHETTI CHRONICLES
89. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Silence (I hate total silence, some one should break the ice.) | THE BLACK SPAGHETTI CHRONICLES
90. A Post About Nothing. | Sandalwood
91. From the Once Loud House – Evelyne Holingue
92. Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Other People’s Silences | Pop-Culture-Referenced
93. Enjoy the Silence | Life’s Unfiltered Ramblings
94. NaNoPoMo and the Way into Life | Rose Red Stories
95. The intimacy of silence | SomeThing Different
96. The Sound of Silence | Starting write now
97. Daily Post Weekly Writing Challenge | rachelcurry95
98. THE SOUND OF SILENCE … | Reflectingpool …
99. War’s Profound Silence | Lewis Cave
100. Shh…It’s Krantz Cake. | The Novice Gardener