Article January 11, 1993 Issue

Second Thought

Looking again at news and commentary

"Full silence" by Fenella Bennetts—July 30, 1975

The Christian Science Monitor

"Friendship is like music—sometimes the full orchestra, sometimes the chamber ensemble, the unaccompanied suite, or the pause between movements.

"Music is not only sound: silence is one of its elements. And silence is not a void. It can be filled with the glow of sound just heard; or promise of sound to come; the thrill of the unexpected; the poise of an interlude; or the poignancy of a told truth. Silence points up sound, prepares us for it, gives relief from it, enables beginnings to be born from endings.

"Friendships have silences in them. Maybe these silences too are basic elements of friendship. They don't have to be tear-filled or fear-filled. What we fill them with is up to us. They can be love-filled silences. They have their own particular music which we often need to play unaccompanied. They are growing seasons, teeming with quiet, invisible activity, like the resting in winter when each must tend to his own roots. The next budding and blooming is not in question on account of it, but assured because of it.

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