is the word 'diary' better than the word 'blog'? probably not.

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Silencio! Shhhh....

Often we think of speech as our way of delivering ourselves over to others. But then sometimes it�s as if the very act of speech threatens to dominate the situation, obliterating what is communicated in not speaking.

Of course, the danger in not speaking is that you�ll think the silence means one thing, and your compatriot will think it means something else. You could think the silence is significant, or contemplative, or freighted with meaning; someone else might find it boring or unremarkable; or perhaps silence will make everyone anxious. Etc and so on.

Then again, you might say something, and think what was heard was what you meant to say, and then find that something altogether separate from what you intended was understood by your interlocutor. (File this one under �did you mean what it meant?��though that question can be posed to silences and actions as well.) Words don�t keep you tethered to the safety of transparent communication.

It is nice, then, to be surrounded by old friends who have the skill of knowing what you mean, sometimes even better than you do. Words and silences are more comfortable here. Sometimes they weigh nothing, other times they carry everything. Living, geographically speaking, at a distance from those moments can be lonely.

But there is also a joy (and a risk�they often go together) in beginning to converse with someone who may become your friend in some real way. There�s a moment when it strikes you like that�as something not yet there but on the way. And, strangely, it�s as if that kind of communication is full of silences that do say something, even when they are conveyed in words.

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2:05 a.m. - December 08, 2006

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