The Sound of Silence

Silence. It's a wonderful sound. There are times when silence can be the most beautiful conversation between close friends.
Silence can often mean that two people are so at peace with one another and know each other so well, that they don't need to fill the air with unessessary words. Paul Overstreet and Don Schiltz penned it beautifully when they wrote the country love song..."You Say It Best, When You Say Nothing At All..." And who doesn't enjoy the Tremoloes singing "Silence Is Golden"

There are times though when silence can be deafening. I recently experienced that.

I had a friend. I wouldn't say we were really close, but I liked her a lot. We both celebrated birthdays in the same week, and also celebrated our wedding anniversaries on the same day.

She was flawlessly beautiful and quite spirited. She also had a range of musical talents too. But what I really admired about her was her ability to write. She truly had a God given gift of writing. I was quite in awe of her. And although I'm 20 years her senior she's twice the writer I could ever be.

She had a blog. I would read absolutely everything she wrote. Often wishing I could be so eloquent with words as she was. It saddened me though that, most of the time, no one commented on her poetry.

I told her a few times that I thought her writing deserved a bigger audience and that many people would enjoy and be blessed by her writing. I also told her she was my favourite writer. And she most certainly was.

Three years ago, I too started to write. I found that I could write poetry and had a gift for rhyme. But I was a little unsure of myself, since I have no college or university education. I started posting my poetry on facebook so that my family overseas could read my poems. I was a little nervous,  thinking that my friend would read my half hearted attempts, and see that I wasn't any good. But I also wanted to share my new passion with someone other than myself.

Immedietly some of my friends told me that they enjoyed my poems. I enjoyed the compliments. But since my friends were not writers, what I suppose I really wanted was an endorsement from this friend. She commented on my first poem...I was thrilled. It meant the world to me coming from her. After all she was a real writer.

 I started writing more. But as I wrote more and more...she said less and less. In fact, after the second poem, she said nothing.

I never tried to compare myself to her. We're very different writers. It would be like comparing apples and oranges. But I thought that we could encourage one another in our gifts and in our service to God, just as it says in the Bible. 1 Thesselonians 5 vs 11. I did encourage her. Often. She however, was silent.

I decided to start a blog this year. The first thing I did was become a follower of her blog. I was excited to be blogging too. I thought we could share experiences. Again, I would comment on her work. Over and over. Again, she was silent. She didn't follow my blog. Not even to encourage me as her friend. At first it didn't bother me. I found some poetry sites and started submitting my writing. My following grew. I thought my writing wasn't good enough, but then, other writers, really good writers, started telling me that they enjoyed reading my work. Still however, she said nothing.

But the real blow came when did say something. She sent me a note saying "I enjoy visiting your blog a lot, it seems you are very busy writing..."
What? You enjoy my blog? Really? Then why not follow? Why not encourage? Why not comment? Why the silence? This made me so upset.

I stopped following her blog. I stopped encouraging her and commenting about her (very beautiful) baby and family. I was sad about doing this but aren't relationships meant to be give and take?

Last week, we both celebrated birthdays. Although it was hard for me to do it, on her birthday, I sent her a birthday greeting. Three days later on my birthday I waited to see if she would respond.  She did respond. I received from her what I always receive. Silence. She knew it was my birthday and couldn't even find it within herself to say Happy Birthday. So this is Christian love?

"You say it best...when you say nothing at all..." Her silence spoke volumes to me.

I made the painful decision to delete her from my friendlist on facebook. Not because I don't like her and not even because I'm angry. I deleted her because I can no longer listen to the sound of her silence.