Silence is the true friend that never betrays - Confucius

Reading a single page of a book or magazine uninterrupted in my house is impossible. Finding a single location that is insulated from the noise level of life in my home is harder than finding a lost wedding ring in a mile of sandy beach. My home's noises are not unique; they just seem louder and more disruptive than normal. I will never join a book club - my house does not ever let me finish a book.

To read a single page of a magazine or even the list of ingredients on a cereal box, I have to tune out: children, television (on weekends and vacations), Todd's jazz grooving, the dogs barking, the phone ringing and the computers dinging. It paralyzes my cerebral cortex. I am on a constantly moving freeway of cacophony.

Years ago, studying with music plugged into my ears on my awesomely cool yellow Sony Sports walkman, Alphaville blasting away, Mom tinkering behind me at the stove and Jess doing back handsprings across the foyer, I could focus on studying. Fast forward too many years to count and tying shoe laces with music on has become an epic challenge.

Quiet and noise are a cat and mouse game in the house. Quieting one television enables an iPad. Muting an iPad enables a stereo. Diverting the stereo output to Todd's man room in the basement elevates Chop Chop Ninja on the playroom computer. I never effectively bat the mole on the head and win my prize - a few precious moments of silence. Silence or a poor imitation of it is more valuable to me that food. Its my sustenance and recharge and unfortunately, it's around as often as rain in the Sahara.

Electronic noise and child unite as one

When I am not trying to read or think or stammer out a complete sentence, the noise is livable and forgivable. After all, what can be expected in an average size house that shelters a family of five, four dogs, two non-stop chirping love birds, too many electronic noise-making devices and one piano whose ivories get hammered despite no one knowing how to play the first note of Heart n' Soul. My mom and my sister, both who keep very lovely and serene homes, can literally survive for just a few short hours before they become symptomatic from the discord. My sister has often told me, being in my house physically hurts her ears and pounds her head. Much of her communication while visiting consists of emphatic SSHHHhhhsssss. She cannot be blamed for her sensitivities. Noise levels in my home may ultimately be proven toxic to one's health.

A few years ago, I noticed my hearing was not acute or sharp any longer. Add background music to a conversation and streams of sound became  intelligible to me. Sitting at my kitchen table with my friend Jessica, cell phone answerer extraordinaire, Todd's music in the background, often she'll say, "Are you going to answer that or just let it ring forever?" Huh? Answer what? I hear nothing. Yet my nothing turns out to be a cell phone ringing with apparent urgency, a few feet away on the counter. It's just back noise to me. At 38, I hear less and less. In the indirect fashion of math; the sounds in the house keep getting louder and louder and my range of hearing keeps getting lower and lower. Darwinian at some level I imagine.

The noise that carries my household from sunrise to sunset doesn't always bring me to a frustrated boil. We have oodles of excessive laughter, excellent conversation and many I Love Yous screamed from room to room. Hooting and hollering is always the usher into our den when we do family rounds of Just Dance on the Wii. Remi successfully completing a difficult clarinet piece in the kitchen sends out waves of applause and the additional accompaniment of Todd on the Sax. In-house obstacle courses require a ton of cheering and encouragement and Karaoke is a must - at full stadium volume. Add the game of fetch with the dogs, our long hallway being used for soccer, chair racing or monkey in the middle, Remi making a video with her best friend Christina, Chad walking any where - thump thump and Eden babbling a made-up song to a tune never heard before, we've got awesomely rejuvenating noise.

I am often the island surrounded by a sea of lively dolphins clicking away at each other and I don't want to quell their fun. I just can't tolerate it as well as my kids and husband can. Finding a solution other than moving into a sanitarium or locking my kids out of the house, is my responsibility.

Way off to one end of the house, is a guest bedroom. It's colder than all the other rooms in the house. No one opts to hang out there. We often use it for storage. It's door has a lock. There is also a bathroom deep in a corner pocket. There is no basement underneath this room to radiate a pounding base note from below. The cable box is currently disconnected and the phone's ringer is permanently set to off. There is a seat in the bathroom for me, the toilet. The lighting is great for reading anything and for a few short but miraculous minutes each day, I read my book, one gloriously uninterrupted page at a time until the noise beckons me out and envelops me.