In one email, a friend wrote about a client who spends much of her life flying. She was talking about a recently failed romance where she and her new lover flew off to some exotic destination. They had a wonderful time, yet on the flight back, her new lover jacked in to his iPod and they didn’t have a chance to talk about there relationship and what had happened to them on the sunny beaches. The therapist suggested that perhaps the lover didn’t have the skills to talk about the relationship. I presented a different interpretation. I like the way the email came out, so I’m posting it here.
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"I have done with words, how much better the silence, the coffee cup". I remember years ago when I stumbled by some great luck into a talk by Vanessa Bell talking about her aunt, Virginia Woolf. She talked a little bit about that great phrase and how Virginia Woolf would wake up early, make coffee and sit quietly drinking her coffee and thinking.

My mind goes to Wittgenstein's Tractatus, where he tries to put everything nicely into a logical framework, tying it together with "Whereof, one cannot speak, thereof one must remain silent".

I imagine myself in the role of the man sitting in the airplane. I too, might have put on the iPod to sit quietly next to the woman I love, savoring the time. Yes, it might be a defense against her wanting, needing, trying to talk about the wonderful experience, and my need to be quite and bask in it. I might stroke her hand gently, kindly, and as she tries to talk about it whisper a simple hush. I might think of the elderly couples that I've seen walking quietly down the boulevard holding hands, and not speaking, and thinking about how wonderful it would be to arrive at such a place.

Months later, I might realize that my need to be quiet, silent, in a mindset of Virginia Woolf or Ludwig Wittgenstein, and her need to talk about things one should not apply words to was an indicator of why the relationship was doomed.

I imagine that the young man is listening to Simon and Garfunkel's Dangling Converstaion.

It's a still life water color,
Of a now late afternoon,
As the sun shines through the curtained lae
And shadows wash the room.
And we sit and drink our coffee
Couched in our indifference,
Like shells upon the shore
You can hear the ocean roar
In the dangling conversation
And the superficial sighs,
The borders of our lives.
And you read your Emily Dickinson,
And I my Robert Frost,
And we note our place with bookmarkers
That measure what we've lost.
Like a poem poorly written
We are verses out of rhythm,
Couplets out of rhyme,
In syncopated time
And the dangled conversation
And the superficial sighs,
Are the borders of our lives.

Yes, we speak of things that matter,
With words that must be said,
Can analysis be worthwhile?
Is the theater really dead?
And how the room is softly faded
And I only kiss your shadow,
I cannot feel your hand,
You're a stranger now unto me
Lost in the dangling conversation.
And the superficial sighs,
In the borders of our lives.

Years later, the young man may reflect in therapy what he lost by not being able to open up and use words, about being too caught up in his own love of silence and savoring the moment to be able to meet the needs of his new lover, as he wonders if analysis really can be worthwhile.

Perhaps this relates to Lena's comment about how the posts on the list used to be shorter. We all have needs about how we communicate with others. I savor the silence, yet write long posts. Perhaps this illustrates the importance of why face to face is so important. Even when we are face to face and communicating without words, very important messages can get lost. Yet it also points to the importance of finding ones voice, finding ones words. Woolf and Wittgenstein, who savor the silences, were also masters of the written word.

I need to write a little more today before I head back to my conference, but first let me put on the iPod and stare into my cup of coffee.

Postscript: I may be bring a bit of myself into the scenario. My first marriage ended in failure, perhaps in part, because I was too much like the young man on that flight of fancy. Yet during the therapy I went through during my divorce I learned to be more attune to other people's need of speaking, as well as my need to find someone who can sit quietly with me and simply know that she is loved.