Silence is Golden
As I sit here at work I’m having a hard time becoming motivated to write. That’s been an ongoing problem for me for the last couple of months. It seems that whatever negative forces I’ve let come into my psyche have sapped my creative supply. I’m also faced with the inevitable forced socialization that comes when more than one of us is on a shift here at the shelter. I’m naturally a good listener but it can drain me completely sometimes. And depending on who the other person is will determine just how much energy I’m left with at the end of the shift.
I’m trying to remember just how fortunate I am. It’s funny that even working where I do, I find it possible to lose sight of just how incredibly blessed I am. I even sneak off to the quiet kitchen just to dry the dishes for some much-needed moments of stolen solitude. That being said, I do have to say that some of the personalities that tend to drain my energy the most are also the people who know how to have comfortable silence in the office-which is such a gift. I don’t want to forget to mention this because not everyone knows how to be around others in a small space and allow comfortable silence. A lot of people will feel the need to fill the space with idle chatter and nonsense just so it seems like there’s relating taking place—when often, alienation and irritation is what this sort of chit-chat produces.
Sometimes for me, happiness is quiet; happiness is nothing; happiness is absence. I tend to slide between extrovert and introvert but normally reside comfortably on the introvert side of the scale. Therefore, being held captive by someone who is entering their ninth minute of a self-involved, trivial story of losing their favorite coffee mug only to find it once again in the very cabinet in which it belonged. You know this story—and the myriad stories like it that never end; have no point and only serve to relieve the storyteller of their quota for daily expelled words. I can’t. I’d almost rather be alone scrubbing toilets….almost.
Oddly enough, I find that my hydration plays a huge part in my patience level as well-just sayin’ cause it’s important but that’s a whole different post – wait for it.
