My Reticent Son

The opinion of 10,000 men is of no value if none of them know anything about the subject. ~Marcus Aurelius

My son recently said someone told him he talked too much. This made me think about how reticent my son used to be.

When he was young he was very sociable, pleasant, and cooperative. Everyone like to be around him. He loved to play, play, play. He would not talk much, though he laughed and engaged in conversation, there were times when his silence made me wonder how he could be so quiet. He was passive, non aggressive, and curious. I was concerned he would be vulnerable to many fringe groups with cult like ideas.

When he was a teenager he would listen with intensity to my discussions about life, war, politics, money, love and other subjects. He seldom interrupted my lectures and did not ask too many questions. I could see him self absorbed with my words. I thought he might be bored, and being a good loyal son, he did not show any expression of his boredom.

When he graduated from high school he was fearful of the world ahead of him. He felt unprepared for the "jungle" he was about to enter. All his life he had been told what to do, when to get up, where to show up for class. His basic needs had been provided for him. Now he had to provide for himself and make his own decisions. He would have loved living in a commune.

From his reticent days as a teenager my son spent 4 years in the military, working in a sensitive department. He worked his way through college. He worked in the financial services industry. He was a licensed insurance and real estate broker. He learned to fly and sail. He started a small business and developed it successfully. He was a voracious reader. He was a student of life. Society, and his experiences and observations, were a laboratory for experimenting with his views. Over and over his views were reinforced by these experiences. He learned a lot, and the verification of his many views gave him confidence to express his views when he saw errors in others. When he visited me, he did more talking and I did more listening. The student had become the teacher.

During his adult life my son has developed self reliance. He has gained a lot of confidence through his independence. After he became an adult I told him he was free to pursue happiness, but he was responsible for any choice he made in his pursuit. The result of his choices were positive. These vindications of his choices gave him the confidence to speak out.

What caused a reticent child to grow into a mature, confident, renaissance man filled with robust certitude? I think it was a childhood that did not teach him to worship idols or myths. He never attended a church. He was never taught racism or bigotry. He was simply taught that it is wrong to harm others. He was taught that he is responsible for the outcomes of his choices.

Children raised from infancy to worship a god or emperor have little doubt about the world. Had my son been snatched from his crib as a baby and raised in a Muslim world, by the time he was 18 he would have been supremely confident. He would know that Allah was making all of his decisions for him. He would have memorized the Koran and bowed to Mecca 5 times each day. He would not have feared the world, and it is unlikely he would have transformed himself into the critical thinker he is now.

Bilbo Baggins