I Love the Quiet

      The most peaceful moments for me are when it's quiet. Yes, I know I enjoy being by myself for long periods of time. I can go without talking so that when I talk again I can hardly recognize my voice. Ever hear a mouse rusting under the leaf litter? It has to be quiet to hear the mouse. Have you ever heard the little noises a nuthatch or woodpecker makes when it's within arm's length?  There are many sounds we never hear because it's too noisy.

       I turn my furnace off over night so that the furnace fan doesn't wake me up. I'd turn the fridge off if I could get away with it.

      Quiet times for me go back to growing up on prairie farm. We didn't have electricity. Just think of all the noise that would be absent if you didn't have electricity. The cook stove fire whispered quietly. The house creaked occasionally. That was it . It was quiet. Yes, we had a radio that used very sparingly. It was only noisy when kids played in the house.

    I had the backwoods cabin once! Then I moved and had to give it up. That cabin was quiet. Again, the only thing that made a whisper was the fire in the cook stove.

    When the power goes off in my house there is a pleasant peaceful feeling. Once in awhile the power went off at school and all the air conditioning stopped. The kids would stop talking. The quietness was beautiful.

     Large commercial buildings are incredibly noisy. Commercial buildings have huge echo power. Hospitals are terribly noisy. These building have nothing that will muffle sound.

    Airport terminals have thousands of people, air conditioning and many conveyor belt. T

here's also that PA system that is constantly giving messages. It's nerve wracking and confusing. Now I learned a big lesson when I left the Calgary airport and arrived in Lahue in Maui. There were thousands of people around me in the terminal but it was quiet. Machinery wasn't running. The terminal was open to the outside. People did not have to yell at each other and were very calm. I couldn't believe how quiet it was.
   
     Now I don't get to enjoy quietness very often but I always long for it.

    How about you? Do you enjoy the quiet or do you need  some noise around you to make you fell comfortable?