Because You Never Asked

(5/06)

     Perhaps by now, after almost 15 years of compiling these exercises in dubious philosophical patter, it has become redundant to remind the reader when the scene of these musings moves to the Spanish Mediterranean, as has been the author’s wont for 2 months of every year since even before the inception of these scribblings. Being that the occasion which hatched this essay could only have taken place here, I feel duty bound to inform the reader of my corporal transference to this magnificent part of the world.

     Within 2 days of my arrival this year, a long time French friend, whose consistently young-at-heart, emotionally healthy “bon vivance” will forever make his more elderly years seem irrelevant, invited me to dine at his modest home with his wife and 2 other French people I’d never met before. It turned into a fine round of good food and good cheer, which included just enough competence in English to include me in the merriment.

     Whenever groups of people get together, there is always a varying degree of personalities falling between the extremes of gregarious loquacity and timid shyness. Regardless of differing interests, talents, professions, philosophies, life styles, tastes, economic status or social class, all these manifestations of who or what we are outwardly present themselves in differing ways. For those who are more extroverted, there seems to be far less mystery as to why someone would be that way. Being the “life of the party” is generally seen as a more rewarding role to play than that of the shy person occupying the anonymity of unperceived presence. One can more easily understand someone attracting attention to oneself, trying to show what they’ve got, who they are, interacting, taking part, or feeding off and giving back to the group. It would seem more in tune with the ego content of most human beings. But trying to understand those who are more reticent, who seem to shrink away from the light, is a more daunting task.

     When my older sister arrived to a marriageable age, all the talk would be about this young girl or that female cousin, all at an age where the proper mate became the primary focus. I can still remember my mother saying things like, “oh yes, Ellen is a nice girl, but she is so quiet”, as if she were cursed.

     Perhaps it would be prudent to mention, in discussing this idea of the “quiet person”, that we are skipping over the years up through adolescence, because it is useless to dwell on years so fraught with angst and insecure posturing as the real person behind the mask tries to find its way through to its secure place in the final product. Suffice it to say, we are talking about adults here, people now well entrenched in who they are and “how they be”.

     Before returning to my pleasant gathering with the French people, there is one person I’ve known for about 25 years that cannot be excluded from any discussion of “quiet people”. He’s been a fixture, like myself, at the same public tennis courts I learned to play on more than 30 years ago. Let’s call him Bill.

     There is nothing abnormal about Bill. He is a reasonably intelligent fellow who plays a good game of tennis. He works, goes about his business, gets along with one and all, the proverbial credit to the community. One not knowing Bill for a long time would never place him outside that vast mass of average Joes going about their lives as it was meant to be, and even for those who’ve known him forever, placing him outside of any normal format for living would be almost impossible. Nobody feels uncomfortable around Bill. He’s just, well, Bill.

     The thing is, Bill almost never talks. The place where I play tennis has had a devoted group of players who’ve played there not just for years, but generations. This familiarity has made the tennis scene where I live a rather gregarious one, much like the locker room of a close knit team. There’s beer, gossip, denigration of our respective athletic efforts, and a healthy level of good cheer and hi-jinks enjoyed by one and all. Players who aren’t even playing will come out and “kibbitz” for awhile, such is the level of camaraderie that has developed. Bill has been a part of this for many years.

     And yet, in spite of the extremely social nature of this typical slice of life, and in spite of the fact that Bill is not at all out of place or the source of any “party pooping” tendencies, he almost never says anything. “How you doing Bill?” “Fine, thanks.” “Do you want to play?” “Sure.” He says the score, will complement others for a “nice shot”, will occasionally castigate himself for shoddy play, “see you the next time Bill, take care”, “thanks, see ya”.

     In all these years I have never seen him initiate a conversation. I can’t ever remember seeing him laughing with gusto. He’s not a sad person, or one that conjures up pity --- how to explain Bill?

     Some personal data on Bill: as a young man he was attractive and well built, with a wholesome kind of good looks he has managed to largely maintain in spite of a bit more weight and a streak of gray here and there. Even more encouraging is that he comes from a well to do local family that possesses a prosperous business, including a generous swath of valuable real estate. He’s rich! He’s not gay. In spite of all this, he has never married and seems to have had little in the way of romantic consummation.

     Regardless of the placid nature of his cultural assimilation, much of this speaks of something socially flawed in Bill.

     This could hardly be considered the case for the woman I met just a week ago at the French dinner already referred to in this essay.

     French women have a habit of ageing gracefully as they take their first steps into the foyer of old age. Marie is just such a specimen, still handsome and well preserved, enough that her sexual allure from her more ripe years was still easy to imagine. In fact, one almost didn’t have to imagine it.

     Marie showed no signs whatsoever of being a socially flawed person. She teaches English in the French school system. Her husband, a cultured gentleman who’s voyage towards his golden years was transpiring with an equal degree of grace and aplomb, is a medical doctor. Their incomes have conspired to provide a second home on this beautiful island, and their children have begun to give forth with a sprinkling of grandchildren who’s extraordinary beauty was documented photographically.

     Marie is a “quiet person”.

     Of the five people present that night, 4 of us shared a level of participation that could have been divided into something bordering on equal parts. It is undeniably evident that Marie spoke far less than anyone else, perhaps as little as one word for everyone else’s 10. But, as it seems with most “quiet people”, there was also a detached quality that, at best, can go unnoticed, or, at worst, can be considered rude or insulting. The “quiet people” we are currently examining rarely fall into the latter category. Their lack of verbiage is usually tied to a genuine character trait, not to some pompous disdain for what is being said around them.

     Marie in no way altered the positive ambiance of the festivities, so much so that I didn’t even begin to think of these things until I’d arrived home that night. Her presence was in no way perceived as negative, and, in her own way, it probably enhanced the general tone of the gathering.

     How to explain Marie? In examining the mini-participation of an integral person of her kind, one who seems to have triumphed in life, it is difficult not to find unflattering reasons for such (of course, what traumatic baggage her life’s journey might carry cannot be known by most people, though this is not relevant to her status as a “quiet person”). Being that we can put aside any intellectual deficiencies which might make her reticent or self conscious --- in other words, any feeling of inferiority --- one has to begin assuming that our conversation simply did not interest her, was insipid, simple minded, dull, not worthy of attracting her attention --- that we were talking just to flap our mouths.

     It’s highly unlikely that any of these reasons were conscious elements in Marie’s minimal participation. It can be said with almost complete certainty that she did not go home that night and feel as if she had just been subjected to 3 hours of tedious stupidity, 3 hours that included the more normal intervention of her husband.

     But one having been unfortunate enough to begin dwelling on such matters (guilty) cannot help but ask oneself: just what percentage of the noise that comes out of a person’s mouth is useless swill, pedantic prattle, habit, convention, vulgar attempts at camaraderie, insincere patronizing, egotistical attempts to draw attention, adolescent role playing trying to impress, or just plain nonsense filling the time before we die?

     In the end, I think I’ve always had a secret admiration for “quiet people” like Marie.

     Relevant Material: “En una boca cerrada no entran moscas” (Literally, “in a closed mouth, flies don’t enter”. In other words, shut up and fish. This is an old Spanish saying.