Silent ViolenceSilent ViolenceSilence can be uplifting and edifying to the soul, and the need for silence can be at times most overwhelming. But there is also a silence that can be crippling and destroying. It comes in many ways, creating walls instead of the opening that creative silence brings. The author experienced this destructive silence in her life and felt weakened by it. She has written Silent Violence to examine the effects of this silence, search for understanding, and explore ways to overcome its limitations and hold upon her and others who have had similar experiences.
Drawing on journal entries from telling periods in her life, Ms. Brick breaks the silence and reveals the pain to bring healing to others who have experienced similar imprisonments. She hopes that others will be inspired by her own suffering to confront the silence instead of covering it up and allowing the wall of silence in relationships to grow higher and more impenetrable. She writes: "It is through breaking out and dashing down these walls with words - and crying out for deliverance and guidance to God and to those experienced and trained to give such help and direction - that freedom will come. Remember, you do not ever have to submit to Silent Violence and you can truly learn to live again."
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Table of Contents |
Introduction
1943
1953
1993
Afterword
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Excerpt |
1943
Soon the Lux Theatre will be on, but I am not allowed to listen to it tonight. If I am as bad as I am supposed to be, I would put it on anyway but very low, then listen for my Mother's footsteps. I could get the radio turned off in time if I sit close to it. I wish I could just lie in bed and hear it like I often do and not have to worry. But I can't tonight. I'm afraid to put it on. My room is in the back of our house on the second floor and it faces our back driveway. When we hear the air raid sirens, I have to pull my shades down all the way and turn my lights out, and it scares me. If it was a real attack, then the Germans couldn't see our home if we had all the lights out in every room and all the shades down. The sirens always seem to blare at night and I can't wait until the all-clear sirens come. I ask Jesus to help us. I heard that on the New Jersey coast that all the stores must be blacked out on the boardwalk or the Germans could come up out of the water in their submarines and torpedo the stores and boardwalk. They'd come right out of the ocean! Or the Germans could fly over in their planes and do the bombing. I wish this war would end. Oh, the poor people in Europe must be so scared. I guess I'll get undressed now and go to bed. I don't know whether to go down and say good night or not. I think I will just go to bed....
Blue Dolphin Publishing, 2003