1 EAGLETON NOTES: Silence

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Saturday 2 October 2010

Silence

When I was a young man (I was, once, honest) I was driving back to Liverpool from the Lake District with a girlfriend (I think at 21 in those days we still called each other boy/girl friends) where we'd been for a short break.  At one point we'd been silent for quite a while and we realised that we knew each other well because we were comfortable with the silence between us.  We had no need to talk.  I was reminded of that today by Heather's quote on Facebook by Elbert Hubbard that  “He who does not understand your silence will probably not understand your words.”  I used to have on my wall the words "We do not know each other yet.  We have not dared to be silent together."  However, unusually, I didn't attribute it to anyone.  I have Googled it without success.  Does anyone know if it's a quote or did it come from my head?

7 comments:

  1. too true. I remember thinking - as a very young musician - that music was just as much about silence - or the spaces between notes, as it was about the notes themselves.
    a comfortable silence is a valuable thing between friends.
    now, I really do wish I could sleep!

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  2. That's a lovely thought. A comfortable understanding relationship has long parts in it where people just 'are being' instead of doing.

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  3. A cliche maybe, but it really is golden. I like silence a lot. Almost as much as I like loud, live music. An oxymoron, but true.

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  4. Umm, we're friends, right? No need to say anything!

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  5. Previous post was an experiment. I was not allowed to leave a totally blank comment. But the three dots were accepted.

    But since silence can have different meanings and might be especially tricky to interpret in writing, perhaps I'd better add a few words...

    The idea I think is common goods, whether the exact phrase is a quote or not I don't know. Well, if it wasn't found on Google before, it is now. Referring to this post of yours! ;)

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  6. I think, Pauline, we are very comfortable being silent together - or would be if either of us ever stopped talking! Seriously though - no, there's no need.

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