The Power of the Silence

This was the title of my Senior Speech at the "I AM" School when it was in Santa Fe, New Mexico in 1966 in May there when I just turned 18 the month before. I had registered for the draft a month before which kind of gave me the willies because the Viet Nam War was on.

I had chosen the title of this speech even before I left for the school for my senior year. I had been going to drop out of high school and get a job mostly because I was dating a girl 21 when I was 16 and had bought my first car from working after school in my Dad's Electrical Contracting Business.
Then I was dating another girl going to L.A. State University there in Los Angeles who was one year older than I. This combination made me think I was a grown up and over High School completely. One of the best things my parents ever did for me in my life was to talk me into going to the "I AM" School in October 1965 when I was still 17.

This speech for me was about how I was quiet mostly from birth until about age 15. I listened to my elders mostly and learned what their experiences were. Since my parents were ministers I met a lot of very educated traveling ministers who had traveled the whole world. One was a retired high powered lawyer and another couple were a good friends of our family always.  They even bought me a Davy Crockett (Disney) suit with fringe and a toy rifle that was a musket. At 6 years old I looked pretty cute dressed up as Davey Crockett of historic fame and Disney TV lore. Disneyland was my favorite program on TV then as it educated us about space and yet there were always funny things with Donald Duck and Daisy and Mickey Mouse and Minnie back then. Remember there were only 3 networks back then (no cable or internet yet). So there was only NBC, CBS and ABC as national networks then. We got about 13 channels through our aerial then from Mt. Wilson in Glendale, California then if you include the independent local stations then. Then there got to be UHF stations that you tuned in more like a radio than clicking on a station through the aerial.

But, the Power of the Silence I always could relate to. I was always walking somewhere alone or riding my bike alone then. Though I always had a lot of friends sometimes they were just too silly or crazy for me to take very much of. A lot of kids were pretty crazy then. I find kids a lot more spoiled and not crazy like they were then but out of touch with reality in a completely different way now than then.

What inspired this article is I picked up a book because I was looking for the package of CD's for "The Hobbit" which is an older version that some actor reads of the original Tolkien book. One of the CD's was left in my trucks CD player for awhile that my daughter had put there during one of the trips we had taken within the last 6 months or so. So, now I was hard put to find the rest of the cd's it went with.

The paperback I picked up was a book called "The Power of the Silence" which made me think of my Senior Speech so long ago. The fact that I knew what my speech title and what it would contain 9 months before I had to give it inspired the other 3 seniors in finding their titles and compiling their speeches too for graduation in May 1966. After the coldest winter I had ever lived through that far in my life where temperatures were common down to about 4 or 5 degrees Fahrenheit at night there in Santa Fe, New Mexico at 7100 feet in elevation, I had spent many weekends in the snow in Santa Fe and up in the mountains there. My spirit had become renewed and my cynicism from childhood epilepsy and knife fights I had to observe at lunch in my high school in Glendale were washed from my brain, because I was the tallest and strongest person at my school then which was nice not having to fight anyone for any reason. This was a really nice year. I had never gone to a private school before where people didn't have to fight to survive. I had only been to public schools where arguments often got violent in one way or another at public schools.

The Power of the Silence I have always found to be useful as a much younger man I would sometimes go fast for 7 days in the wilderness on water and lemon juice and maple syrup. (The lemon juice cuts the acetone that your body generates as it detoxifies. It prevents headaches while fasting.

But, by age 40 or so I found I couldn't really fast anymore because of low blood sugar so I had to give up fasting by about 45 or 50. I used to do 4 day organic Watermelon fasts because it dissolves the plaque in your arteries and veins and prevents having to have a heart bypass operation some day. But you still have to eat right to stay healthy on top of this.

Being in the wilderness was my church. It still is. I don't usually find God in churches. What I find in churches instead is a variety of people's concepts of God. But, if I want to experience God myself I go alone into nature so God can more easily speak to me "In the Power of the Silence".