My house, growing up, was never silent.
The Home Service ( Radio 4) blaring out. Radio 3’s classical music blaring out and jazz blaring out from my father’s quadrophonic speakers.
Nobody talked in our house; parents screamed at each other.
I took refuge in my room trying to dodge the cacophony.
Homework was achieved, somehow.
Piano practice was an irritant to my father.
‘Where’s your fucking rhythm’ he’d shout as I tumbled over Chopin and crashed into Bach. I had to play them perfectly if I diidnt want a maniacal response from my maniacal father.
Conversations turned into arguments.
Arguments turned into full scale shouting matches. .
We had regular ‘socials’ My Communist Party parents hosting crowds of noisy lefties. The occasional fascist, that my father had taken under his wing, was subject to his Stalinist rantings. The day my mother took to a saucepan to shut the fascist up was legedary.. She stationed her self at the front door and landed a ferocious bullseye on top of his dome.
He stumbled onto the doorstep never to be seen again.
.
I relished school with it’s quiet discipline
At the grammar school I experienced genuine peace.
The only noise was the whirring of clever kids brains.
I met my first boyfriend in the school library. A book lined haven. No talking or eating was allowed.
I smuggled in a bag of ‘Treats’ a chocolate confection.The bag broke and the chocolate pellets scattered all over the floor. I was banished for a week.
Now I live in silence. No traffic noise outside the cottage, the road was closed after Mr. Somerset had endless vehicles smash into his house. Mr.Somerset, a man of authority, campaigned, and won, for a bypass. We now live in a tree lined enclave, apart from falling acorns only the postman and Amazon deliveries disturb the peace. Food deliveries come and go.
I always wanted to go to Cambridge, I had the dream of the worlds third oldest university housing me in a quite corner of a square.
Cambridge never happened, I was taken round drama schools by an inspirational teacher who told me.I would act.
And act I did.
My career took me all over the place. From the shipyards of Newcastle to the mines of Doncaster.
But my first trip abroad was to Denmark – a mask making course in the middle of a forest. The only sound was the chirruping of Danish birds.
From Frankfurt to Israel – I learnt my craft. From Wales to Malmö – I travelled in silence. No headphones back then. Speeding over the cobbled streets of Amsterdam, on the back of a motorbike, I dismounted walking like John Wayne.
The company was male and very loud. When an audience member chucked me his keys I jumped at the chance and relished his loft apartment on the Herengracht Canal. Up in the eirie the only sound was the clanging of ancient church bells.
I took the Dutch man to meet my mother. He had flown in, crouched on his knee in the pub next to the Royal Court Theatre, and proposed to me. I took him home to meet my mother. Standing on the doorstep, trepidatious and anxious, my mother opened the door.
She took one look at the geezer from Amsterdam and refused to let him in.
‘You’re too ugly’ she said and slammed the door in our face.
I talked to the man fifty years later and he revealed that my mother had also accused him of being a player.
‘Were you?’ I asked.
He laughed.
He’s now 85 and lives in Spain.
When we lived in Wapping, it was still quiet. Two old pubs and the sound of masts rattling in the wind. The opining of the halyards on the moored boats.
I love the sound of The Thames.
Now it’s the sound of foxes at night. Or the cawing of crows in the day. The endless cooing of pigeons and a braying donkey in next door’s farm.
I am considered noisy. My best man told me forty years ago that highly spiritual people talk loudly, on account of them wanting others to find God.
My loud voice is a result of drama school training and the need to be heard. Standing on a stage and projecting to the balcony was part of the course.
Things have changed though.
The old git and I are like two old people on the bus., Whilst we hold hands, we can go for hours without a word between us.
I’ve taken to groaning when I stand up. sit down or have to do the washing up. Luckily the ‘oosbind is now hard of hearing so he doesn’t realise I’m a moany old woman.
The television is louder than most people dare and music is always played at levels ranging from 85 dB to over 120 dB,
The neighbours can’t hear it on account of our thick stone walls.
Of course I blame my father for my uncontrollable volume, the sins of the father.
Today, standing on the doorstep with the door wide open, the only sound is the wind in the trees and the gentle drip drops of rain. Not to mention the old git eating his toast – which may I say – is extremely loud.