The Sound of Silence

When I was in highschool, my friend Mary hated the hit song by Simon and Garfunkle, "Bridge Over Troubled Waters."  This troubled me.  What was her problem?  And if she didn't like the bridge, I wondered, what would she say about the sound of silence?  What can you say?  You shouldn't say anything; that's the point. 
Yet...  I love silence, or atleast I think I do.  Those hours between bedtime and the jarring awakening of the bastardly alarm clock.  Quiet, yes--silent? No.  There is the noise a page makes gently grasped between thumb and forefinger, the soft purr of Dinah, settling in ever deeper, melting into my shoulder like silk and butter.  Outside, the wind murmers against the window, muffled by sheer glossy curtains.  And something else, a branch? a bundle of oak leaves? scuttles across the naked roof. 
I've never met silence, I decide, and I consider that a gift.