Embracing Silence

Orientation week for research postgraduates should have had a compulsory module entitled Embracing Silence.
Eager-beaver PhD hopefuls should have been tested on their ability to sit long hours without saying a word, tested on their ability to remain sane under pressure without the comfortable social pillow of rants with classmates about upcoming deadlines. After all, there are no classmates in a research programme. Especially if you do not work in a lab, are not affiliated to an existing programme of research and are basically the only one who seems to know what on earth you are researching (and even this is not always so clear). Those lucky enough to have started during the autumn term have it easier: offices are warm, no one wants to be outside. There are no barbecue smells wafting in from the lakeside. There are no sounds of: giggling, birdsong, wind in the trees, impromptu football, ice cream fights, bumblebees, music, bicycles whizzing along sun warmed stone, friends gossiping. Life.
For those of us (read: me) who started during the spring term, the office is a space of silence, the outside is a cosmos of sounds reflecting a fast awakening summer. For those of us (read: me) who started during the spring term, there is the twin hurdle of overcoming the seemingly instinctive magnetism towards sunshine and the apparently insurmountable urge to share it with friends. Looking at the sunshine dappling everything with green and gold outside does not compensate. Having friends at a distance (read, over the Internet, away back home) does not compensate.
Embracing silence.
Yes. If I ever get this dratted PhD, and am ever talking to 'new' students, this is what I will tell them is the hardest thing to do.
For now, its a couple of hours of reading and writing before I succumb to the sunshine.