Silenced

At the present moment, I am in the throes of quite a nasty cold that has been floating around school, and one of the results of said cold is that I've completely lost my voice save for a whisper.  And not even a stage-whisper, but a real whisper.  For a motormouth like me, this is an interesting experience.  I have so many things I want to say, but it's either too painful (my throat feels like a bunch of rusty razor blades rubbing together every time I swallow, speak, or mouth-breathe) or it goes unheard because I have no volume.  Plus, in order for me to get back to work as a music teacher, I need to rest my voice so that I can speak, sing, and otherwise vocalize with the kiddos.  So I'm staying quiet for a few days.

Yesterday I visited my mom and my uncle and rasped through some conversation.  I was so excited to share my experiences about my new job that I didn't really pay much heed to the hoarseness that kept getting worse as our brunch went on.  I stayed quiet on my drive back home and made sure to gargle with plenty of throat-soothing things, but I woke up today completely voiceless.  I was pretty much completely hoarse last night and so my husband and I had a quiet evening (he's not much of a talker), and today has been eerily quiet.

I grew up in a home that seemed to hate silence.  At least my mother and brother did their best to fill the home with as much talk as possible.  My dad was always okay with quiet, but as we got older, my brother's constant talking became a presence in the house that we were totally used to.  (He even talks to himself if no one's around.)  When I met my husband, I found it odd that he could sit with his family in near-silence, just reading a book or watching TV, and we would all be the better for it.  At my husband's family's house, we didn't have to fill every silence with words or noise.  We could just *be.*

I still struggle with this concept of just *being.*  I am a born and bred motormouth, and I always want to say things, discuss things, ask questions, share stories, and converse with people.  I thrive on a certain amount of social interaction (though I like my alone time too).  But right now, I have time to sit back and listen and think, instead of being at the forefront of every conversation.  I wonder if it's a need for self-expression that makes me want to talk so much.  As it is I feel like I haven't really expressed myself all day, even through the text messages I've sent to my husband to tell him things he couldn't understand me whispering.

It's been a frustrating day, but also an educational one.  Tomorrow I will be silenced again, as my voice has not even begun to come back yet.  I hope by the end of tomorrow I can at least start to stage-whisper.