Peepers appreciate silence

Stunning quietude in the southwesternmost park in NH

In the late 2010s, when I was working in the backcountry as an AMC hut manager, my crew members and I had this weird habit. On the occasions when we would shower, shave, and briefly venture into the Real World for a couple of days, we would case city streets, athletic grounds, or wherever we found ourselves, searching for interesting signs to plunder after dark. I’m talking street signs with peculiar or funny names like “Bilbo Terrace,” and evocative facility signs with service information such as “Clothing Optional!” The destinations for these stolen signs were the walls of our hut, where we mounted them like taxidermized moose heads. When you live in the woods, even seasonally, you have to create your own world, and it’s usually a very strange world.

I only nicked a small handful of signs myself, but my brightest trophy came from a tennis court in Los Angeles. It was a big metal sign that read “PLAYERS APPRECIATE SILENCE.” It caught my eye on a day hike with two friends, as we were coming out of the woods near the tennis court. I couldn’t get the sign out of my head, entranced by the words and their layers of meaning. I had to have it. So that night, I went back to the tennis court with clippers. A few days later, I checked a suitcase at LAX with the sign stuffed under folded clothing. It lived at Madison Spring Hut for at least one summer and fall. I’m not sure where it is today. AMC hut signs have a way of disappearing. But every now and then, I’ll remember those three words, and I’ll chew on them for a while.

In the most literal sense, the meaning of the sign is obvious. Of course tennis players are going to appreciate silence when they’re locked in a sweat-soaked match. But if we define “player” more broadly as someone involved in a game of any kind—say, the manipulation of a person’s emotions, or the pursuit of something beautiful yet elusive—could silence be a showing of strength and confidence? Let’s say you work at a car dealership and two of your coworkers are trying to a sell that shitty Jeep Patriot that’s been sitting in the back lot for years, accumulating moss on the undercarriage. The first salesperson, whom we’ll call Joey, is bragging about how he’s got the latest prospective customer hooked, and how he’s about to go in for the kill. But the second salesperson, whom I’m calling Beth, is cagier; merely alluding to a prospective Jeep Patriot buyer and offering little more than a cool smile when you ask, “How?!?” If I have to place bet on who’s selling the old Jeep, it’s Beth, with her self-assured silence.

woodfin CC BY 2.0

Now let’s apply this idea to one of the most beloved recreational activities in New England—Leaf Peeping! It’s now late September, which means that far northern New England is already approaching peak foliage, and the southern realms are rapidly trending toward auburn. People are scrambling to make their plans for leaf peeping voyages, and many of them will face a conflict. They want the most ethereal views of golden-hued valleys and canopies, ideally all to themselves, without the cacophony of car engines and iPhone camera sounds. But they also want that grease-stained bag of donuts at a cider mill, that mug of Hefeweizen in a beer garden, and that first cup of coffee on the porch of a fully-booked B&B at sunrise. In other words, they think they want silence but they actually crave the affirmative sound and fury of leaf peeping season; the satisfaction of being part of the commercial leaf peeping scene. But what if you did choose silence as your north star, skipping some of the commercial rituals of leaf peeping and allowing the quietude of an overlooked space to nourish you?