The Free Press, Mankato, MN

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October 7, 2008

Searching for the sounds of silence

By Tim Krohn

The guy on TV is yelling something about a crisis of unprecedented proportion. There are bells clanging as they show stock-market traders slumped around the floor.

I turn down the sound.

There is a new scene on the screen. I’m not sure what they are saying, but I think Sara Palin is showing Katie Couric how to gut and field dress a bull moose, then make an attractive lamp from its sinew and antlers.

They’re both smiling, but I get the feeling they don’t like each other.

I think maybe a drive will help. The noise from the jackhammers on Madison and Victory makes my body vibrate as I pass by. People honk their horns and the car stopped next to me is emitting a rap song with thumping bass.

My temples are starting to throb.

At the mall, there’s a din from the food court. The surround-sound system on the plasma TV at the store booms the theme music from a movie.

It’s a noisy world we live in and it seems to get louder all the time. Or at least there’s more noise more often. Besides the racket of life we’ve always had, the array of hand-held devices and assault of video and instant communications makes it nearly impossible to get away from the noise.

People actually escape the hubbub by slipping plugs in their ears and listening to their iPods. We’ve been reduced to piping loud music directly into our heads to block out the clamor of the world.

More and more, people get antsy if there isn’t background noise — a TV or music playing.

Even when we try to get away on vacation, they are usually packed with activity and clatter.

It makes us sick. Cornell did a study of workers in an open office where they were exposed all day to faxes, phones, shredders and other office machine noises. Their adrenaline — a sign of harmful stress — was much higher than workers in an enclosed, quiet office.

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It’s just after dusk as we sit on the end of our dock north of Brainerd.

The katydids and crickets make their calls by rubbing their wings together. The sing-song of the crickets and the croak of toads are there, but they’re less vocal now that the evening air is cooling.

In the woods the soft cluck of a grouse and, far in the distance, a few coyotes yelp.

Out in the little bay, the slap of tail on the surface of the water from a beaver announcing his territory.

It’s not noise, but sounds. Here, you can realize the difference.

As the darkness closes in, the silence becomes complete.

Nothing but brisk air, stars, a couple of cabin lights across the way.

William Penn must have been in a place like this when he wrote that silence and rest of the mind “Is to the spirit what sleep is to the body, nourishment and refreshment.”



Tim Krohn is a Free Press staff writer. He can be contacted at 344-6383 or

email him Tim by clicking here

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