Catching up with silence

I've only read enough Alice Munro to know she's a good writer--though I think she's stopped writing. Like Philip Roth, Alice Munro's one of those writers who've announced their retirement (which I can't understand for the life of me; writers should just die, like Sam Shepard). But she once said something that's stuck with me and that is: that a writer should write what he or she would enjoy reading.

No matter what you write or how good a writer you are there's a time and a place where and when it's right to be without words. I'm more and more interested in these times and places.

Pavillion, Wyoming, population: 231. I watch the eclipse from the shore of Ocean Lake, a couple of miles from the town of Pavillion, in the so-called 'path of totality'. I'd camped out there the night before in a dinky tent that did everything in its power to discourage sleep, and by dawn I was more than ready for the eclipse experience. But it took forever!

Finally the moon got there, trudging across the face of the sun, but slowly, slowly, so slowly. Then everything on earth turned darker and darker, and there was a brilliant halo of light around the dark sun for a few moments, and the mosquitos got confused and thought it was evening, and then the eclipse was over. It was a real experience, one I'll not forget, far beyond any words that might be used to describe it, and watching it took all the patience I have.