Sitting through silence

Sitting in the silence while food cooks

Sometimes it's hard to maintain relationships over the phone. Especially with islanders who are used to the 30 second call to connect. Those calls normally go like this:

Person A: Hi! How are you?
Person B: Good, and you? How are your people?
Person A: They're good, I'm good. What's the news?
Person B: Nothing new, it's all the same. How's your health?
Person A: It's good. Well, I was just calling to say hi.
Person B: Ok, thanks. Have a good day!
Person A: You too.

And that's it. So it's easy enough to call people, but it's hard to stay connected with everything that's going on in their lives. Talk of hopes and dreams, babies and marriages, disappointments and hurts, those are all hard to talk about over the phone.

So when we stopped visiting for awhile due to COVID-19 concerns, relationships took a bit of a hit. We continued to call, to maintain the care in relationships, but so much heart stuff can happen that just doesn't get discussed over the phone.

Jack is rarely silent

That means that when we started going visiting again, it took a bit to get back to the heart-level talk. Sometimes it just means sticking around for awhile. Talking about nothing for awhile. Sitting in the silence until the heart stuff bubbles to the surface. Because the heart stuff is still there.

So that's what I'm doing-- spending time with the people I need to spend time with. Sitting in the silence until the real returns. Talking my real stuff so they feel ready to talk theirs. 

Do you ever have to sit and wait for the real stuff to surface? Do you have the patience for that to happen? What relationships do you have that need a dose of time and sticking around for them to go deep again?