I am sitting at the fringes of a sprawling field on a sunny Sunday, contemplating a breezy daffodil. In the way that it has appeared here at the edge of nowhere, when there are no other daffodils in sight, it mirrors my own soul. We both welcome isolation to the extent that we seek and thrive in it yet we can still be cheerful while basking in its delicious melancholy. But no, I should say, rather, that we are cheerful because we are basking in Isolation's delicious melancholy.

The daffodil's resolute chirpiness in a green sea of loneliness was what attracted me to it in the first place. A lesser soul would surely have died a miserable death long ago. Silence is a commodity that has long lost its nurturing value. Modern humans find silence abhorrent. They go to weird ends in a futile effort to deny themselves of what they mistakenly perceive to be gaping maws that lead to the dark bowels of boredom. I wish more people would give in and embrace the mundanity of life. Then maybe the world won't be so noisy all the time.

We want noise

As a so-called alternative, noise has not much to offer. It has its uses, but mainly it gives rise to junk. The modern world is full of inane chatter that says absolutely nothing. The TV is on 24 hours a day (for those who have Astro) and the Internet is now available around the clock at the touch of a button, but how much smarter have we become? How deeper are our lives? A cousin of mine has installed a TV-cum-DVD player in his car, "for when I'm stuck in traffic jams, or those long journeys to keep the children quiet"! Whatever happened to conversation? (Reflection would be too much to hope for, I think.)

If someone were to invent a magic wand that could mute the noise of whatever object it was pointed at, I guarantee the said inventor would be lynched dead in the streets within a week and the recipe for his wand burnt, its ashes ground, before the remains - and his - are scattered to the wind. People don't want silence because it forces them to confront their inner selfs.

So they surround themselves with noise, hoping that it will make their senses too busy to go inwards. They try their darnedest to project their attention outwards. They mistake leading a full life with having a lot of possessions. That's why they fill their homes to the ceilings with all sorts of furniture and trimmings that are not only superfluous but also ugly to boot. (And those who do have minimalist homes find themselves leaving their vacant spaces for the sanctuary of noisy streets and coffeeshops a little too often, for in reality they find Space and Silence uncomfortable, but what to do, it is tres trendy lah.)

People have been made to be afraid of the power of their own minds. They are afraid that they might accidentally conjure up an idea that might turn into a monster who would consume them. They don't have the answers to many things in life, they realise after years of experience, and so they are content to switch

on the TV and let a half-rate journo with a flaky degree whose facial make-up is thicker than his IQ do their thinking for them.

Life is like polyester: boring

Their greatest fear must be that, deep down inside, they know that theirs is a life that is meaningless and, ultimately, boring. They are simply not interesting, because they have never made it a point to make their lives actually interesting. Nor do they have anything interesting to say, because they have never had an interesting thought. And so they busy themselves with chatter, thinking that if they produced or listened to noise, then their life must be interesting.

The daffodil and I, on the other hand, find silence to be the most interesting thing of all. There are other - prettier - flowers clumped around us within striking distance, but it matters not a whit. We are complete, this daffodil and I; we have no need for another. Unlike others of our species we have no need for attention, confirmation or assurance. We are happy thinking what we think without the need to have another verify it for us. It is the only way to exist, if one were looking to properly exist.

But in truth, I am lower than this daffodil. Because while the daffodil is content to sit silently in its corner without bringing attention to itself, I write.

RUHAYAT X is a publisher, writer and literary sex symbol. His blog, Neohikayat Press , speaks for him.