Essays from West of 98: A Quiet Place
Let’s talk about a quiet place.
Hold on. Don’t fret. This is not a review of a horror film released in 2018 or its 2020 sequel.
I’m talking about a true sense of quiet. I’m talking about the quiet places (wherever you find them) that are both peaceful and calming.
I have been thinking about this topic for a few weeks. Then yesterday, our pastor gave a sermon called “Silence.” It focused on Elijah’s fleeing from the murderous King Ahab and Queen Jezebel and his journey into the desert where, free of all the encumbrances of his life, he found spiritual renewal and an encounter with the Lord. That struck me as a pretty good sign to write this essay.
It is hard to find quiet in our lives. As the pastor and I discussed after the service, our lives are full of devices that were intended to make life “better” and “more convenient,” but the result has been the opposite. We are expected to always be available and responsive. It is harder for employees to leave their work at the office. Our family, friends, and acquaintances can almost always reach out to us, and us to them. If you engage yourself in social media on any level, there’s an added demand. There’s the expectation that we will post things and our self esteem tells us that we should post things that get a sufficient number of likes, comments, and shares or retweets. We need to keep people updated on our lives. We need to post the right things on holidays. Oh and if that wasn’t enough, the constant firehose of news and information on social media demands that we should have an opinion about every topic of the day and then offer our opinion, but make sure you don’t offer the wrong opinion, because then you might get subjected to an internet pile-on.
WHEW.
It is no wonder that Wendell Berry owns neither a computer nor a cell phone and prefers to communicate by letter. He knows what he is doing.
Some of Berry’s best work is his collection of Sabbath Poems. These poems were written on his Sunday morning walks through the woods in and around his Kentucky home and they comprise some of his most beautiful thoughts on nature, farming, life, and the world around us. There’s a sense of clarity that comes from being alone with your thoughts in a quiet place like the Kentucky woods and it shows in these poems.
I’ve written about this phenomenon before, through the power of legendary prison writings. Martin Luther King, the Apostle Paul, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and others found their most powerful voice while they were sitting alone with their thoughts in a jail cell. We don’t all need to go to prison, but we all do need to find our own quiet place, wherever it may be.
I have shared a bit on social media this spring about my nascent efforts at gardening. I work a desk job all day and I need exercise, but I am not naturally athletic and exercising is often a miserable chore for me. This spring, I chose to pursue outdoor labor as exercise. So far, it has been a success. This is also where I find quiet time. There’s no gas-powered tiller or any other noisy apparatus. It is me, alone with a shovel and a mattock, gardening by hand. Occasionally, I have an audio book (usually a Wendell Berry novel about bygone eras of rural life), but often it is just the sounds of the world around me.
I have not had any earth-shattering revelations that will result in writing like Berry or a speech like Dr. King. But the quiet is good for me. It is relaxing and peaceful. It freshens my mind. If you do not have a place to seek the quiet silence, I encourage you to seek such a place. You’ll be glad you did.
James Decker is the Mayor of Stamford, Texas and the creator of the West of 98 website and podcast. Contact James and subscribe to these essays at westof98.substack.com and subscribe to West of 98 wherever podcasts are found.