Silence

After 3 days of a snarky cold, I woke up Thurs. ready to go to work/school and get out of the house. Unfortunately, that was the day my vocal cords decided to rebel. As the day of teaching wore on, it was getting tougher and tougher to talk, let alone teach. (Teaching inherently involves the use of the "teacher voice" which implies authority and demands respect. Without it, I sounded like a muppet trying to run a classroom.)
By Thursday night, I could no longer hum. By Friday morning, whispering was painful. Teaching was out of the question.
So was talking.

Dave had work, so I settled into my 4th day that week of sitting in front of my TV doing not much of anything. Also, trying to whisper in Spanish to my housekeeper. And thanks to a few gruesome remarks by my seniors, I was actually gripped with fear that God had condemned me to a life of listening and my voice would never return.
Which got me thinking about what a life without my voice would mean.

First, Dave would have to start talking. Not a few people have joked that the poor man doesn't get a chance to say much, being married to me. Have you seen the movie "Up"? There is a scene at the beginning where a little girl says to her new friend, a little boy who has not yet had a word of dialogue in the movie, "You don't say much do you? I like you!" And Dave and I saw that and fell over laughing. Someone has to listen, and he does a great job. I do not, so much, but he has encouraged me to listen more to him that I do to most anyone else, and I suspect that I get the benefit of more Dave words every day than nearly anyone else.

But no voice would also mean no more singing in the shower, no more phone calls home, no more small group Bible studies, no more drama directing, no more haggling in the fruit market, no more arguing with my brother, no more responsive reading at church... well, you get the idea.
I was kind of surprised at how much I use my voice every day, and how much God might really want me to shut up once in a while and listen. Maybe, if I wasn't talking so much, i might actually get better at a few other things on my list of things I may do someday when I have more time on my hands than I know what to do with: practice piano, meditate, learn photography, get in shape, plant a garden, knit a sweater, adopt a kitten, memorize scripture, write poetry.
I wonder how many of those things I would be good at if I wasn't so good at using my teacher voice?