The Coming Silence

My eldest son is 7 and is a lot of different things, but one thing he especially is, possibly above all else, is noisy. Even amongst his peers (and 7-year-old boys is quite the peer group), he stands out as an order of magnitude or two more noisy. It’s not just talking - he walks noisily, he eats noisily, he plays noisily. If there’s a way of doing something, you better believe he’ll be doing it with the decibels turned up.

He didn’t speak for a long time as a small child, but then when he learned to speak, it was like he’d been storing it up. He went from no words to a rich and varied vocabulary in no time at all, and he speaks like there isn’t enough time in the world to get through what he wants to say. I’ve recorded him before, so astounding is the pace and breathlessness with which he speaks. From 500 yards away, we can hear him (and him alone) playing with his friends in the park. I’ve heard one of his friends ask him quietly “Why do you speak so much?”

Today, though, breakfast was quiet. He was reading a book and was so engrossed in it, he didn’t narrate his way through his bowl of cereal. It was briefly nice to be able to talk easily and freely with his four-year-old sister…

For all I sometimes wish he’d just slow down, quieten down, and let me hear my own thoughts…eventually, he will. And it’s likely to be permanent. At some point, probably sooner than I think, he’ll stop narrating his thoughts, or wanting to know about everything all at once, or plotting and scheming and storytelling.

The silence is coming, and I predict I’ll love it for a day, and then mourn what I’ve lost for a decade or more.