A portrait of the value of silence

Aria M. Morton
Jul 22, 2017 · 3 min read
Kenya

We’re in Mombasa, Kenya, a few hours from boarding school at the beach for our senior trip before graduation. The afternoon hours bring in the highest tides, and my classmates thrust themselves into the waves, tumbling backwards toward the shore in sparkling laughter. I take a respite on a boulder to the right of them, watching as the waves collide against the rocks around me, teal drops spraying my skin and licking my toes.

Glancing back and forth between them and the horizon, I breathe in, smiling gently while also wincing at momentary twinges of grief. The bougainvillea bushes and palms rustle silently around me in the sticky breeze.

Something catches my eye on the flat rock below, and I gasp in surprise. Straining to carefully reach down for it without tumbling off balance, I scoop it up, clasp my fingers around it, carefully inspect.

It was a favorite Kenyan creature, a carved, wooden rhino, perfectly in tact except for one broken leg. Holding it close to my face with one hand, I run my hands over the smooth contours, reveling in the serendipity of this ocean treasure. Reveling in a moment of feeling utterly seen and loved and known. Holding it close to my body, the sunshine on my arms feels a few degrees stronger and the sounds of laughter from the wave-tumblers just a bit more full.

It is a few years later now, far from Kenya, far from the ocean, far from the ocean-tumbling comrades and smack dab in the middle of finding home. I am in Missouri, on a former college campus that is now traversed solely by a few security guards and tenants like myself, and the many woodsy creatures which boldly claim it as their own.

On many days, I come home from work and walk by the wooded, algae pond. I walk and walk, silently pondering, ruminating and praying, dreaming and creating, wrestling and healing.

I memorize the hideouts of Meryl Streep and Bill Murray, the two groundhogs that poke their noses out when they hear my footsteps from underground, and anticipate seeing Rudy and Tillman, two of the three foxes that cross my path before fleeing into the shelter of a wood pile.

The quiet sounds of wind and steps and leaves heave aside the noisy barriers I build and eventually, the barriers are compromised. The fears and grief beneath the surface bubble up and in the summer stillness, I have nothing with which to suppress them. The dam cracks, and longing tears pour through journal pages and phone calls and evening walks, disappointment exposed and given a hug.

Toward the end of summer, I am sitting in my second-floor townhouse room, studying by the window. The afternoon sun is fading into twilight, casting golden rays through the fully-leafed branches of the nearby tree.

My mind’s eye sees the rays glimmering over the Indian ocean horizon, and I reach over to the book shelf and clutch the rhino. Reveling in the moment of feeling utterly, uncomfortably, completely known, and loved, and seen.

Written by

Exploring, understanding and activating community. ariamorton.com //

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