The story of 71-year-old traveler and activist John Francis, who once decided that he was speaking too many harsh and incorrect words - and fell silent for seventeen years. Voluntary austerity paid off: John became an eco-activist, completed his Ph. D. and learned to listen to what others have to say. Francis talked to Snob about American society's rejection of blacks, recalled the rise of hippies, his rejection of transportation and oil spills, and explained why words don't always have to make sense.
I fell silent on my 27th birthday when I realized I was opening my mouth just to whine or say nasty things. I poured shit on everyone I came across, although it was only worth pouring on myself.
It was 1973, the height of the Vietnam War, a difficult period for the United States. Among the hippies at that time, the Back-to-the-land-movement was in vogue, the essence of which was to leave cities for villages and love each other there. Nice dream, but it was difficult to realize it. The dreamers did not understand how much work there was on the land, and when they reached the villages, disputes began. Everyone argued - and I was the most, because I had terribly low self-esteem. Not least because I was black: The Civil Rights Act of 1964 certainly outlawed racial segregation, but it was one thing to pass a law and another to change the way people think. Even ten years after the adoption of this law, I felt second-rate. Now black youth have heroes - Barack Obama, other politicians, athletes, musicians. And then we did not have role models, we did not believe that we could become someone worthwhile. I screamed all the time, asserted myself at the expense of others, carried crap and lied. For example, if someone said: “And I play the banjo,” I replied: “Yes, I'm a hundred times cooler than you, because not only I play the banjo, but I also signed a contract with a record company yesterday, okay? No, do you understand or not? - although, of course, there was no contract.did not have.did not have.
A year before I shut up, I became completely unbearable. This happened after I witnessed a collision of oil barges in the San Francisco Bay in 1971. The leak was about 3 million liters. I looked at this spot, at dead fish and birds and was outraged to the limit. Birds especially upset me: I grew up in Philadelphia, and they were my biggest friends - the only animals in the big city that I could communicate with when people pissed me off. I said: "Guys, I will never get into a car or any other means of transportation with a motor again," and began to walk. But it seemed to me that this was not enough - we still need to tell everyone how smart I am. And I endured everyone's brain and spoke a lot of empty words. Friends used to drive past me in a car and call: "Johnny, jump in with us." I answered: "I can't, I am saving the planet."And they: "You just want us to feel like shit." It was true. And I also thought that when I started walking, everyone would take an example from me. I called my parents and said: "Mom, Dad, I no longer ride a car and I am happy." Mom replied: "If you were happy, you would not need to talk about it."
The first week, everyone was wildly amused that Johnny finally shut up. And I suddenly realized that I began to listen to what others were saying. It was a strange experience: earlier, during a conversation, I spoke myself, and then, instead of listening to what the interlocutor was saying, I prepared my next remark. Listen to the interlocutor? No never.
I liked to be silent - it brought peace. Only once did I accidentally let it slip - after six months of silence I stepped on the stranger's foot and said: "Sorry."
I had to leave work: who needs a music producer who is silent? But in those years it was possible to live without work. My girlfriend and I moved into a deep forest. Then it was easy to find some kind of housing, even a house without water and light. Once we decided to visit friends in San Francisco - it took us all summer to get out of the forest, take a walk with friends and return.
Photo from the personal archive
Promotional video:
My girlfriend was at the same time with me until I asked her to go from California to Oregon - I was going to study there, I wanted to get a bachelor's degree in ecology. She said it was too much, that she just wanted to drive and live a normal life, and I went to Oregon alone. I walked 500 miles in a month, went to the dean's office at Ashland University, showed them a newspaper clipping describing their program, and gestured that I wanted to take part. When a couple of years later my parents came to my graduation, my dad said: "Son, we are proud of you, but you have been silent for what year and have not driven a car - what will you do with your diploma?"
I threw my backpack over my shoulder and went traveling. Making pocket money was not difficult - you could hire an oyster farm, or mow the lawn, or unload a truck. Money was easily negotiated on the fingers.
A few months after graduation, I returned to California and got a job as an assistant to a shipbuilder - I wanted to learn how to build ships. The boss liked that I was silent, he said that I was his best student, because I knew how to silently watch him closely, understand, repeat and not bother him.
I built my first boat, rode it, and then went to Montana, to the University of Missoula, where I looked after a master's program in ecology. Two years earlier, I wrote a letter to that university, warning that I would come. And when I got there, the university took over my tuition fees, even though master's programs cost thousands of dollars. In my spare time I taught lessons. I had 13 students. These lessons were pretty funny: we gathered in a circle, and I showed everything on my fingers. "What does he want to say?" “I don’t know, he seems to be saying something about clearcutting.” - "Yes, yes, clear felling." - "No, guys, look, he is showing a hand saw, which means he is talking about selective thinning of the stand!"
Two years later, I received my master's degree and moved on.
On the tenth anniversary of my silence, I wanted to talk. I wanted to feel that I am silent of my own free will, that this is not a prison. I called my mother - she thought it was my brother. I had to tell her a story that only the two of us knew: a couple of years ago we rode an elevator together, I was silent, and my mother said: "If you really cared so much about the environment, you would not ride the elevator." Only after that did my mother believe that it was me.
I got lonely at times. But loneliness is part of human life. Sometimes I went into the forest for five weeks, and when I went out and saw people, I felt joy. You need to learn to live alone in the forest, learn to love your loneliness, then other people will be able to love you. If you hate yourself, what can you expect from others?
I only stayed with those people who accepted me as silent. I left other people. When my silence became a burden to others, I left. It happened that they dug up to me in random bars. Then I just took out the banjo and started playing. Or smiled.
In the late 1980s, I reached the University of Wisconsin at Madison - I wanted to write a scientific paper about oil spills, and I defended my PhD on this topic. So when the Exxon Valdez happened in 1989 (the Exxon tanker accident off the coast of Alaska, which spilled more than 40 million liters of oil into the ocean. - Ed.), I was immediately hired by the US Coast Guard. so that I write standards for employees - how to deal with oil spills. I worked for a year, quit and moved on.
I cannot say that while I was silent, I made some incredible discoveries. More often than not, I just enjoyed nature and listened to people. It’s funny that a man who chatted all sorts of nonsense for a long time, wanted expensive clothes and a car, fell silent and walked for many years.
I had no problems with girls - they adored me so taciturn. In relationships, words are not needed, all the most important in them is non-verbal. When I entered the next village, the girls quickly found out that I was the same guy who didn't drive and was silent - news came from neighboring villages, which I had already passed. Those who first of all thought: "If he is silent, how will he compliment me?" - they were not interested in me, and this simplified life: there were only those who thought: "He is interesting, I want to get to know him better."
In 1990, I reached Washington DC, where I was invited to speak at the Earth Day celebration. I went on stage and said, "Thank you for being here." I did not recognize my voice, I laughed and thought: "My God, who just voiced my thoughts?" My dad, who was sitting in the auditorium, rolled his eyes: "Well, Johnny is absolutely nuts," and my mom yelled: "Hallelujah, Johnny spoke!"
In 17 years I went through the country, became a PhD (Philosophiæ Doctor), wrote a book, met thousands of people, played millions of melodies on the banjo, and learned so much about the planet and pollution that it seemed to me that I finally had something to say. I performed in Washington, and then sailed on a sailboat to the Caribbean Gulf. I walked across all the islands, got to Venezuela, spent a couple of years there, until I got on a bus in 1994 on the border with Brazil - I didn't want walking to become a prison for me, and decided it was time to move on.
For the past 20 years I have been teaching ecology at universities and try to listen carefully to what others have to say. Every year I do myself four days of silence. When I just started talking again, I decided that it would only be important things. But over time, I realized that human speech is like music, and to convey the meaning, sometimes such an ordinary meaningless melody at a dinner table with a pleasant person is enough. If you say only important things, focus only on smart things, then you deprive yourself of the concert.
Author: Polina Eremenko