SENEGAL
listen to silence.

Babies can learn language, but it takes a lot of wisdom to know how to use it. The six of us had traveled for most of a year without a serious quarrel. While trying to make an insignificant point one afternoon I raked Jason. Hard-knocks schooled as he is, he struck back without hesitation. Before I knew it none of us were speaking to each other.  The other five guys are the closest I’ve ever come to having brothers, and with just one careless phrase I shook our whole foundation.

While spontaneous comments can be good jokes, making them is not worth the times that they cause hurt. I discovered the hard way that one sentence can do damage that a hundred kind acts cannot repair. Our wrestling coach shared with me a proverb that I’d heard before but never understood. He said “wisdom is knowing and not saying.”  We must remember that our spoken words barely skim the surface of our experience and have a great opportunity to be misunderstood.  Senegal taught me to strive to speak less and say more.

That night, lost in our thoughts, we all ended up bumping into each other down at the beach. We didn’t say anything for a long time and I didn’t want us to. There was something in between us, within our silence, which said everything that needed to be said. It was unconditional love. Sometimes it’s just hard to hear over the words.