Every Thursday night I sit quietly on a folding chair with five Silence Addicts in room B-11 under the Episcopal Grace church on Broadway. The room’s walls and floors are covered with orange shag carpeting – amateur sound-proofing done years ago by the minister’s son, who apparently planned to record a Christian acoustic-rock album there. The members of Silence Anonymous and I softly sip coffee and smile at one another. No one speaks. Some are blissed-out – in true soundlessness for the first time all week – while others already seem agitated, knowing that, soon, they will have to break this peace and begin whispering about their struggles. Step One is admitting that they do have a problem and that their lives have become unmanageable.
Unlike these five, I am not an addict. Like most people in this city, I move from silence to noise and back again, on and off throughout the day, without much care or notice. I shower each morning and enjoy listening to my waterproof radio; they each only ever bathe in the tub – the constant spray of water echoing off of the tiles is like torture to them. On Saturday nights I typically go out with my friends to crowded bars and listen to music in the close-quarters of the Mercury Lounge and Joe’s Pub; these people sit at home with all the windows shut tight and covered with old pillows and comforters. I like to write pieces like this one down on Broadway in a bustling coffee shop and to clear my head I catch a movie in a public theatre while others around me chatter on; they spend hours in the city’s least popular museums and libraries, rushing away when they hear approaching footsteps. I go to work each day at New City Magazine and sit in my open cubicle, while the noises of the whole office assault my ears each day; they stuff envelopes for non-profits at home, sit for other people’s cats when they’re on vacation, and write code for websites in basements, alone.
Only recently I find myself bothered a little more by the footsteps in the apartment above me, the sound of pigeons in the alley, the hum of my laptop’s fan and the click of these keys as I type.
We continue to sit quietly.
Genevieve Warren, this SA group’s leader, allows three minutes of silence at the beginning of each meeting. She understands that, for many of the members, this small fix of total quiet is all that motivates them to find their way to B-11, through roaring sidewalks full of chattering people, over bridges and tunnels filled with honking cars, or on humming subways and screeching buses. This little orange room is twenty-square feet of sanctuary, she understands, in the wide, cacophonous world.
Silence Anonymous is not exactly like any of the familiar support-groups, though it shares their basic Twelve Step foundations. For one thing, there has never been a settled-upon name for its members. In other meetings, people stand up and say “Hi, my name is Bill and I’m…” something… an alcoholic, a compulsive gambler, an overeater. Various terms have been tried out – Calm-ers, Quiet-holics, Silence Addicts… but no consensus has ever been reached. The medical term for someone with a fear of noise is phonophobic, but nobody likes this term, because they aren’t afraid of noise, so much as they are driven desperately to fixes of pure and lasting silence. In this way they are closer to Narcotics Anonymous – the group’s name is derived from the substance desired, not the pathology of the desirers.
This particular SA group has been gathering for three years now – but only Carl has been there from the very beginning. Only he remembers Frieda, the previous group-leader. All the others have only worked with Genevieve. This is the only chapter for Manhattan and the four outer boroughs – not because there aren’t many more sufferers, but because they tend to seek seclusion. The more I cover these meetings the more I spot them: the ghostly lady down the hall in my apartment who never says hello in the elevator; the guy at my office who all day long wears earbuds, from which I never hear a single note; the man in the blue suit that goes to the 24-hour grocery store at 4 AM when he knows almost no one will be there.
Genevieve Warren is a social worker – a patient young woman who wears colorful shawls – and besides me, the only person in the room who is not addicted to silence. On her advice I’ve never declared myself as a reporter; I remaian observer, silent and anonymous.
Genevieve speaks in a calm level tone that has taken years to perfect. A single raised syllable can send a newer member scrambling for the door. Everyone in the room has rushed out at least once: panting, clasping their hands to their ears. The rule is that you can leave at any time, but you have to close the door behind you, otherwise the anxiety can crash over the whole group like a wave.
Even the coffee is brewed before they arrive – the percolator agitates.
The chief obstacle, as you can easily imagine, is how to foster group unity when they are, largely, mute. Genevieve encourages everyone to speak “out-soft,” as opposed to “out-loud.” Of course, a few have taught themselves sign language, but Genevieve strongly discourages it except as a last resort. The temptation is too great – a whole silent language? Where one can be perfectly understood without a single decibel of noise? She pushes them to write or draw on the white board, which is carefully stocked with No-Squeak markers, and so often the meetings become like extended games of charades, although the term “games” may be misleading. These people’s tales are beyond terrible – long sagas of bruised relationships and fractured families and of incredible stretches of silence-abuse and lonely years of shaky withdrawal.
Many have tried to run off to live in the depths of the woods where even the babbling of brooks, the cries of birds, and the rustling of leaves betrays them.
Carl, having been there the longest, is the de facto second-in-command. He lives his life as an example to the others, to give them hope that someday, they too will be able to live in an apartment without soundproofing. They too can own a washer and dryer, or watch television without the close-captioning on. They can make cappuccinos with real steamed milk. But even Carl still has bad days.
“Last week I found this set of ear-plugs here in one of my old coats,” he says softly, patting his side pocket. “I was going to throw them away, but then I thought, ‘I’ll keep them. Just in case.’ But then all day at work, I just couldn’t focus. I kept thinking I could put them in, just for a second. Just until the guy in the break room turns off the radio…” He winces, the memory still painful, “But then I thought about Ralph.”
Ralph was a member until four months ago, when his apartment building caught fire with him inside it. He was sleeping with his earplugs in and never heard the alarm.
Carl grits his teeth. “I went and flushed those damn plugs right down the toilet.
Everyone nods, knowingly.
Alice and Jonas pat their hands together noiselessly, which is how they clap. After another sweet moment of silence, Genevieve coaxes Jonas to share.
Jonas is the newest member. He’s only been coming for three weeks and he’s still in really bad shape. He goes up to the board and writes “My name is Jonas and I am an addict,” then turns with a wan smile and waves his hand at the group. Everyone waves back. Jonas seems exhausted; everyone can tell he’s only barely made it in. He looks hesitantly at Genevieve, as if hoping that she will let him sit down again, but she reaches a soothing hand out of her shawl and lays it on his shoulder. A small, silent squeeze.
With his eyes closed, he draws a screwdriver on the board. Everyone stirs silently. Teresa is so upset that she actually releases a tiny, but audible, peep – quickly clamping her hand over her mouth as the others suck in sharply. For a minute it seems like there might be a cascade, but then it settles as everyone breathes deep, inaudible breaths.
Jonas mimes the rest of his story. Cradling an imaginary screwdriver in his hands, running his fingers along its length, raising his shaking hands to his left ear – knuckles white in anticipation of both the pain and the sweet release to follow. Self-deafening. Nearly everyone has been at this dark door before, at least once. The only one to go through with it is Gerald, who sits across the circle. We all look at him, because Gerald is living proof that these extreme measures are not worthwhile.
It happened before he joined SA. Gerald was a lab technician at a hospital. He snapped one afternoon, locked himself in a supply closet, and jammed a lancet into his left aural canal. He passed out from shock before he could get to the other ear and then collapsed. It was two hours before someone found him. Not only did he suffer a bad infection, but it grazed the lower part of his temporal lobe and now he has problems remembering names. Worse, to this day he still hears a constant drone in the damaged ear. He’s said it is unmaskable. Undrownable. He will never know silence again. It is a fate worse than death, most of them would agree, but with support, Gerald soldiers on.
Jonas breaks down and Gerald gets up and crosses the circle. He takes Jonas into his big bear arms and hugs him. It all lasts for just a few moments before they part, but both men seem relieved. They are each trying hard not to sniffle.
Next up is Alice, who is only twenty-three. She grew up in an all-deaf-community outside of Rochester, with two deaf parents. In the past, she’s told us about how her parents, like a lot of people in the community, refuse to see themselves as handicapped. They see deafness as a lifestyle choice, which is empowering, but many have a lot of trouble raising children who turn out not to be deaf. She’s told us before about friends of hers, whose parents had surgeries done on them in secret to destroy their ear drums in childhood – some with means just as crude as the screwdriver. Her own parents could not bring themselves to do it. Still, they never quite accepted her ability to hear, and she was always the black sheep of the family. For years and years she pretended not to be able to hear, and spoke only in sign language, and her parents were uneasily happy with this arrangement.
Until Alice fell in love with a bright young physics student at the University named Winston, and saw him in secret for months. She had lied to Winston; told him that she was deaf too. He had learned sign language and bought himself noise-cancelling headphones so that he could understand her world better. For a time, she was deliriously happy, but eventually the day came when Winston clasped his hands together in front of his heart and signed “Will you marry me?” She signed back yes, knowing she had no choice but to finally bring him home to meet her parents.
There was an epic, silent fight.
How could she be with a man that could hear? How did they intend to raise the children? Didn’t she respect their way of life? Hadn’t they always done everything they could to make her happy without sound? Why did she feel she needed to go outside their world to find her happiness?
“What is happening?” Winston kept asking, forgetting to sign, as they signed faster than he could read. “What is the problem with these people?”
Alicelost her temper and then she lost everything.
“Their problem is you’ll never understand this world.”
It was the first time she’d ever slipped up in front of him. She had denied being able to hear for so long she nearly believed that she couldn’t. Winston, feeling betrayed, stormed off; Alice ran away from home and never returned. Now she lives alone inAstoriaand every day she longs for the intense silences of childhood.
“I lost my job,” she whimpers softly. She’s been temping at Phillips & Hargrove, a Midtown law firm. “My boss told me to photocopy a 2200 page report. He said I had to stay in there and watch it run, so it didn’t jam.”
There is visible shifting in the circle at the mere thought of being shut up in a tiny room with the violent loudness of a photocopier.
“Did you explain your problem to him?” Genevieve asks.
Alice ferociously chews her hair in response. Only rarely is anyone able to explain silence-addiction to employers, co-workers, or even family members. There are all the usual difficulties with discussing dependencies, plus few have ever heard of it, so people tend to think it is made up. But beyond this, discussing it means just that – a discussion – which might be quite loud, as we “normal” people tend to raise our voices when we’re confused or skeptical.
There is a rabid scribbling on a pad, as Teresa brings up, as she always does, her feelings that SA members should be protected under the Americans with Disabilities Act, but this is a dead-end. Everyone is loathe to have doctors officially label them as hyperacoustic, or phonophobic, and the SA program does not encourage this. Their disease is their compulsion for silence, not a fear of noise. The distinction is subtle but vital. An alcoholic craves the obliteration of the drink, more than they fear sobriety itself. Just as an alcoholic can be legally fired for being drunk on the job, so can a Silence Addict be fired for letting their cravings for silence interfere with their ability to do what their own jobs require. Most of them have had a hard time finding quiet jobs – Teresa makes a living now as a librarian; Gerald is a groundskeeper. Carl processes claims for the IRS. Jonas is a freelance copy editor, communicating via email and text message only, always working from home.
Alice agrees to sit with Genevieve after and go over the help-wanted ads for a little while, looking for jobs she might be able to handle at this stage in the game. Alice is young and headstrong, still convinced that she should be able to lead a totally normal life. Genevieve has told me, privately, that each week she worries Alice might not come back. Older members like Teresa tend to be unintentionally condescending, and Alice has been steaming for weeks. Usually being angry with someone involves noise – shouting, banging, screaming… but it’s far more terrifying to watch someone like Alice do it in total silence: pulling at hair, opening her mouth wide but making no noise at all, blinking furiously, flashing middle fingers silently in the air.
Alice returns to her chair to sulk and Teresa stands up. She is Gerald’s wife, a tall Hispanic woman who grew up in the Bronx. She met Gerald in B-11, just about a six months ago and a month later they had a beautiful wedding up in Maine, out on a little island past another little island, in the middle of a wide wooded clearing. Carl and Ralph both came up. Ralph had become aUniversalLifeChurchminister, and led the entire ceremony without a single word. Instead of saying “I do,” they put their ears to each other’s hearts, and listened to the ever-present pumping. A reminder that God doesn’t want them to live in a silent world. Heaven isn’t a silent place, Teresa maintains, whenever the discussion turns that way. In the afterlife that she believes in, she wants to be able to rejoice in the music of the spheres and the trumpeting of the angels.
Teresa has good news tonight, from the wide smile on her face. She slides her hands along the sides of her belly and Gerald grins proudly. They have been trying to conceive for six months now, with no luck, but tonight it seems they have made a breakthrough.
“What wonderful news!” Genevieve says, so excited that she comes dangerously close to the upper-decibels. Jonas begins to scratch at his arm, but his eyes are transfixed on Teresa’s belly.
But immediately, Alice wants to know, “How are you going to raise it?” There’s a heavy, knowing edge to her whisper.
Jonas’s toes begin to tap.
Teresa looks to Gerald for strength and speaks softly. “We both grew up here in the city. Crowded tenements with thin walls. Noise all day and all night. Big families. Crying babies. Barking dogs.”
Jonas is shivering now. Genevieve sees it happening. She offers him a hand from under her shawl, but he is too distracted by his growing craving to notice.
“Gerald’s uncle has a cabin out in the Tetons. It won’t be perfect, right? There’s coyotes, lots of wind, loggers… and no SA groups outside ofJackson Hole. But we don’t want our child to grow up in the city like we did.”
Alice sneers and then at full, normal volume says, “If you love her, you’ll let her live in the real world.”
That’s all Jonas can take. He breaks for the door, throwing himself through it, not even getting it to shut behind him and the noise of radiators banging in the other basement rooms suddenly echoes through our little room. Even I find myself getting a little antsy at the invading sounds.
Carl is Jonas’s sponsor, so he stands up, nods confidently to the others, and goes after him. They need to be sure Jonas doesn’t try to repeat his earlier attempt. Alicelooks deeply sorry for having shouted – she keeps mouthing the words “I’m sorry” to the others. Everyone turns to Genevieve, looking for some order to be restored.
“Teresa, Gerald, that’s truly fantastic news. I know that you will both be wonderful parents and that you will do what is best for your child. Can we all agree to keep the discussion open? Alice, maybe next week you can share your thoughts with us in greater detail?”
Alice nods quickly. Genevieve is a master – just ten minutes ago it seemed like they might never get Alice back again, but now she increased Alice’s stake in the group, made her feel that she can bring her experiences to bear on the lives of Teresa, Gerald, and their unborn child. This is how it works. This is how a community is forged.
A weird silence, even for this group, fills the room. All eyes turn to me. I’m the only one in the room who hasn’t spoken. Again. This happens every night and yet I am inevitably so taken up in their stories that I forget I will always be the last one.
“You have to admit you have a problem,” Teresa says soothingly. “It’s a hard step but you have to take it first.”
The thing is, I do have a problem, though it isn’t an addiction to silence. I have an addiction to them.
For months now I have been coming to these meetings, listening to their stories. I think about them all week long. I know that next week, in line at the bakery I will be worrying about Alice and trying to think of who I know that might hire her. I’ll shudder whenever I pick up a screwdriver and remember how Jonas looked tonight. I’ll be out with my girlfriend and wondering if Gerald and Theresa’s child will be a boy or a girl. I’ll be looking out for Carl, especially, as he is the most likely of them all to be out and about in the wide, loud, world. I’ll lie awake at night thinking about what I’ll do if I run into him at a bar, or in the park. Would I tell him the truth?
I want to tell them all the truth, right there, in B-11. That I’m an imposter. A spy. A voyeur. That I won’t be coming back next week because my story has been called in by the powers-that-be at New City Magazine. But I can’t. If they knew the truth, they’d be furious and feel betrayed. It would reverse so much of the progress they’re making tonight, and that they’ve made all month. Sick with silent guilt, I stand up and gave them each a soft wave in farewell.
Gerald, Teresa, Alice, and even Genevieve all wave back, thinking I am about to begin my confession.
“I—” I begin to speak, struggling to keep my tone low. “I just want to thank you all for letting me be a part of your group these past few weeks.”
I’ve interviewed death row inmates, international celebrities, and ten-term Congressmen. None of them has ever left me this tongue-tied. I stall out and, red-faced, sit down.
Gerald reaches over and takes my hand. “You’re going to be OK,” he says, “You’re so young. God. I think how different my life could be – how much time I wouldn’t have wasted – if I could have seen my problem so young.”
I thank him, earnestly, and everyone stands to join hands for the final circle. We recite the Twelve Steps in a chorus of whispers. Right during Step Eight – we will make amends to those we’ve harmed – Jonas and Carl re-enter the room and join the circle. Both look exhausted, but Jonas seems glad to be back.
We start the recitation over. There is another round of hugs and the meeting ends.
Everyone breaks into small, soft, satellite conversations. Alice and Jonas flash sign language mischievously in the corner, as she tries to cheer him up. It seems to be working – Jonas is shy butAliceis pushy enough to get through. Carl wants to hear more about the baby from Teresa, so the older folks gather around to whisper about pregnancy tips. Carl dares to press his ear to her stomach to hear the fetal heartbeat. They talk about trying to put headphones on her belly and playing music.
Genevieve finds me by the white board, watching.
“This is your last night?” she asks quietly. She knows it is. “Will you miss us?”
I will, and I nod vigorously. It always takes me a moment to remember that I don’t have to use non-verbal communication with her.
“When will the article be out?” she asks, meaning the article.
“A few weeks, if my editor doesn’t jam me up about it.” I look out at the small, soft-spoken family. Everyone is not alone for the first time in seven long days. “You think they’ll be pissed off when they read it?”
Genevieve nods. “They will.”
“I won’t mention that you knew I was a reporter,” I whisper quickly.
She smiles. “I will tell them myself. We can’t have secrets.”
“They’re not going to understand,” I sigh.
“They’re capable of so much more than they think they are. It’s important to let the world know that they’re out there. It’s important not to hide who they are and not to let their addiction define them. What’s the Twelfth Step?”
“‘Having had this spiritual awakening, we try to carry this message to others,’” I say.
“If we get even one new member because of your article, then it’ll be worth it. Even if they ask me to leave the group.”
Genevieve takes my fingers into her ever-patient hand and we gaze out over the five of them, many of whom have unknowingly slipped into fully audible speech in their excitement to be around others like themselves. It won’t last long. Soon they’ll catch themselves and clam up. Soon they’ll say goodbye and slip out – sad to go, but happy to know that tonight they’ll be able to get to sleep – some without ear plugs – and dream of conversations with forgotten family members and a future that is brighter, better, and full of sound.
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Kristopher Jansma is a writer and teacher living in Manhattan. His debut novel, The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards will be published by Viking Press in 2013. He has studied The Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University and has an MFA in Fiction from Columbia University. He is a full-time Lecturer at Manhattanville College and also teaches at SUNY Purchase. Recently, his short story “A Summer Wedding” won 2nd prize in The Blue Mesa Review’s 2011 Fiction Contest, judged by writer Lori Ostlund. His essays and fiction can also be found on The Millions, ASweetLife.org, The 322 Review, Opium Magazine, The Columbia Spectator, and The (Somewhat) Complete Works of Kristopher Jansma. You can also find him on Facebook.
