The peace there is in silence

The night is still. No whisper of wind. No rustling from birds snuggling deeper under their wings. The summer air lies over us like a light blanket.

We've been sitting here for an hour on my deck, my friend Karen and I; silent, contemplative, staring at the stars. Occasionally, I take a sip from my wineglass. 

Finally, Karen speaks. "This silence," she says, her voice croaky in the quiet, "I've never experienced it before. It's so loud, it makes my ears hurt." 

I have to laugh. Karen is a busy banker who adores her stylish Toronto condo, but sometimes escapes the hubbub to visit my quiet corner in a village near Ottawa; she arrives high-strung and talkative, but leaves rested and calm. 

We're lucky. In an age where bursts of noise shake, judder and punctuate our lives, whether with staccato, shrill repetition or a continuous, insidious presence, silence is not just golden and rare, it's valuable and absolutely critical to our sleep, health and well-being. 

Yet we are raucous creatures, with increasingly deafening accessories: surround sound, dishwashers and motorbikes, Don Cherry on HD, open-concept offices, leaf blowers, MP3 players, car alarms and cellphones. 

"The overall level of voice noise alone is increasing," says Neil Standen, a noise management expert and president of Urban Aerodynamics in Ottawa. "People are no longer quietly going about their business; they're doing it while talking at top volume on their cellphones." 

Even if you block others out with an MP3 player, the sound in your head can reach 94 dB -- just below that of a power lawn mower. Then there's industrial noise. Federal and provincial regulations may mean aircraft and trucks are half as loud as they were in the 1970s, but there are twice as many of them. In fact, noise pollution is now so intense, it's affecting our well-being. 

"Noise seriously harms human health and interferes with people's daily activities," reports the World Health Organization, whose studies have linked noise to an alarming global rise not just in hearing problems, but cardiovascular disease, aggression, fatigue and insomnia.