Settling into the Silence

My eyes scan the field searching for Ryan in his florescent yellow tshirt which is now drenched with sweat.  I find him just in time to see him strike one towards the goal although the keeper had found him as well and stopped it.  Darn.  I turn to see my new companion with disappointment across her face as well.  I shrugged and she replied with a quick sigh.

You see, I was watching Ryan play soccer with friends far up north of the city discovering something that transcends language barriers: sports and body language.  My companion was the girlfriend of one of the other players and was very nice.  The only challenge was that she only spoke Spanish and I only English.  Therefore, I only had a few useful words such as gracias or vale or si which don't get you very far in deep conversation.  Over the course of the next 2 hours, I found that smiles, claps, sighs, eye rolls, grins, shrugs, and other non-verbals became a new understandable language between us.  In between the events we sat in a companionable silence equally enjoying the game below us and cool sea breeze coming off the ocean just past the fields. 

When we first sat down, I felt uneasy with the silence.  Often we want to fill these gaps with small talk or empty statements trying to eliminate the quiet.  Quickly my mind raced along with possible things I could say, but the only thing I really could come up with is "Perdona no hablo espanol"  Not really something useful especially since I think she kind of already assumed this by my lack of conversation so far. Yet as I pressed forward through the silence for just a bit it became comfortable.  We shared an understanding that we could use words to communicate, but we could still enjoy the game together.  With each save, strike, and hit we mirrored each other cheering on our boys.  Lucky for me her boyfriend was on Ryan's team uniting us ;)  She even offered my some delicious gummy candy at least I could say thanks.  Together we communicated our distrust of the  bugs starting to swarm above us and the humor in one of the players rolling over and over on the field and the amazement in one strike going far beyond the field past the parks boundaries. 

As frustrating as language barriers are, they do illuminate commonalities between people and highlight some of the clearer non-verbal communications.  You start noticing people's tones and body language since you do not understand the words.  It brings you back to early childhood when you don't know everything and have to use your instincts to make sense of the world around you.  For that game I learned there is always a way to express yourself and you can make friends without words.