In the film Mean Creek, two characters stand before a convenience store, in a last chance effort to connect with one another. There is an unbroken silence between them. Both participants want to say something, but the words never come.

In a similar way, some of the entries in the diary of St. Ignatius of Loyola are a single word: "tears." On days where he experienced what his followers would call the "gift of tears," he had nothing to say. Maybe the amount we write depends on our ability to partake in the gift of tears. When you can cry, there's nothing to say; when you cannot cry, the amount you would have to say becomes overwhelming. And in these moments there are so many words that, weighed down by them, you will be forced to lay on the floor.

Maybe there was a time where words came more easily. My thinking now is separated from words by a gulf.