definition of quiet.

I'm sitting in a coffee shop right now, and an old, Indian couple are sitting at my table.

And they are sitting in complete silence. They're both looking out into the distance, thinking about things. They haven't said a single thing to each other in probably 10 minutes. It's weird.

I mean they're sitting right next to each other, which usually prompts social pressure to have some sort of conversation. I mean it would for me, and I doubt that's a cultural thing.

Maybe they enjoy the silence. And I don't mean quietness. It's a coffee shop, there's plenty of noise. There's a barista grinding coffee. A little girl talking loudly about how her face paint makes her look like a cheetah. A college aged couple is doing that weird thing where they have a conversation they know needs to be comprised of only small talk because they're standing waiting for their coffee, and they know in the back of their minds anything they say is just pre-conversation before the real one when they sit down with their drinks.

But I think that's why I love writing in coffee shops. They're filled with people doing things.

People walking around me. Coffee cups getting coffee poured into them. Old, Indian couples quietly experiencing Starbucks' atmosphere. These things, to me, are quiet.

Actual quietness is distracting. It feels empty. Like there's supposed to be something there, and it's absence is felt by everything around me.

-Ryan