A Magician's Journal : June 26th - "The Silence Treatment"

[Luis Vega]

"The Silence Treatment"
By Luis Vega
Journal of Jun 26

"when the sweetest voice is murdered, in the stubborn and precocious throat"

2 days ago...


I wake up and feel a little strange, my throat hurts but I think it´s ok, probably because I slept with the fan on, the heat in this town is killing me...

1 day ago

I am now oficially worried, my throat hurts like nobody bussiness, it hurts just to talk, let alone eat or drink, gladly my dad is a doctor so I go with him and he check my mouth with one of those wood sticks.

"mmmm...let´see" he says while checking inside my mouth, in the meantime I am very unconfortable, since it feels weird having that thing in my tongue

"I am afraid you have pharyngitis.." he finally says before taking out that frikin wood piece off my mouth

from wikipedia " Pharyngitis (pronounced /?fær?n'd?a?t?s/) is an inflammation of the throat or pharynx.[1] In most cases it is painful and the initial infection can extend for a lengthy time period. It is the most common cause of a sore throat"


"what do I do then?"
"well, don´t worry it´s not so serious and I have the meds right here, but I am afraid that you wont be able to talk normally for about 3 days, and you are gonna have to eat very slow"
"3 days?" I ask for myself, there are so many things I wanted to do this weekend including eat chinese food, well he is the doctor anyway
"and that includes not going out to do magic, the air could make this worse" he finally says

9:00 am
today...

I feel good, not completely good but better than yesterday, I go to work and then my boss Vito realizes that something is wrong with me

"what´s up with your voice"
"it´s nothing"
"of course it´s not nothing, it hears like if you have something in your mouth, if you feel sick, you are welcome to go home and rest, no problem"
"it´s ok" I say
soon I realize that I should have follow his advice...
the air conditioner starts,slowly affecting my throat, silently my pharyngitis gets worse...

4:00 pm
by the end of the day I feel a little bit different, like tired "mmm...a quick nap and everything will be ok" I say for myself...I was wrong...dead wrong


6:00 pm
today..

I wake up, the pain is unbearable...I can´t talk or eat, aside from that I feel good!
my brother enters my room
"hey what´s up!! you know there is a great party tonight...wanna come?"
I hesitate, now, my body feels great, but I can´t talk so I think I can´t go the Plaza Campestre were it´s necesary to talk, but going to a party it´s different, I am not going for money, just to test magic and socialize...


10:30 pm

My dad gives me the meds and I am starting to feel good, but I still can´t talk or eat

"you shouldn´t go out tonight son, I know you feel good but I advice you to not risk to get this worse"
"I feel good Dad, besides I need to blow some steam" I say with some difficulty
"ok, if you start feeling bad, just return home and go with a jacket"

I get in the car with my brother as I think:

"could I really do magic without saying a word?"
"could patter be replaced with silence?"
"should my body, look and hand movements be my voice?"
"should my tricks be more visual in order to replace the patter?"
"could I socialize without talking?"
"could we please stop to buy some coffee?" well this one actually I asked to my brother

 

[Luis Vega]

11:30
The party

"this party looks good!!" I think while I enter and everybody stares at us

I been seriously thinking about body language this past months, how to look, how to move and how to walk, I use to walk while looking down, not anymore...

I walk tall from the moment I enter looking at the front and shaking hands when I found with somebody familiar, I quickly look around and a lot of people are staring at me asking themselves who am I

"you have murder eyes" I remember how a friend described my way of looking to somebody with that quote

"Yes I do" I say for myself I always think that if you are a magician everything counts, even when you are not doing magic, you have to make a good first impression, from the moment you enter a room, to the way you dress...I have working on my image long enough to realize that, going to the gym daily, buying a whole different look in clothes even changing the way I talk, today I feel it paid off...

except for the part of talking, everything is good...

anyway, I did the first step, creating an expectation, while that spread, I hang aroung with my brother and his friends, they talk and I just listen, while I concentrate on what I am going to do, since I can´t talk it´s easy. I have absolutely no idea of what I am going to do, perhaps I shouldn´t have create that expectation...

Doesn´t pass too much time and a friend of my brother ask me to show him the trick with the fork (liquid metal for magicians) slowly and painfully tell him that I don´t want to burn the only one I have for just one person that has already seen it
"oh don´t worry, everybody wants to see it"
"what?" I ask
"a lot of people here have heard of you, then I told them about your magic and that fork trick"

In no time I am surrounded of people and even the music went off. I look serious but in my mind I am rushing, let´s analize the situation, you are surrounded by around 30 people wishing to see the magic of their lifes and I have some good tricks on me, but I lack my voice and my patter, the loop in my wrist won´t work since there a lot of light, the billswitch with thumbtip won´t work too, since I am surrounded and my ring flight it´s not ready also I see some people burning my hands even when I haven´t do magic two of them are potential hecklers...

I do the first thing that comes in my mind, I flourish since it´s visual and prepares everyone to the magic...

I have never thought that flourishing and magic were different, you just need to use it wisely and in harmony with card magic


I start with an opener Sure? my signature trick...unfortunately this trick has a final line "wait are you sure this wasn´t your card?" which I just replace it by pointing the card with my hand...everybody freaked out

then I continue with card to mouth, unfortunately without the indication to square the card with the deck, 2 of them see the moment when I put the card in my mouth....the other 28 didn´t see a thing.

I continue with ACR, it´s amazing how I didn´t need to explain how the trick was going to be and everybody unserstood that the card kept rising to the top,they freaked out in the last phase...

I must say by this point I have yet to say a word and everyboyd is freaking out more than usual

then I see somebody try to make fun of me by calling me names and trying to mess my performance, how do handle a heckler when you can´t say a thing?, so I just stare at him really serious,I could even say that aggresively...he just look at me and he stops, he doesn´t say a word in the whole performance

On the dark side, a lot of tricks that depend on presentation and patter won´t shine in this performance, so I don´t use them...pitty I had a lot of them.

Rubberbands are next, I must say that these also didn´t need a word,I did have to ask for a guy to rub 2 of them so they could link, yet It was painful and short, gladily he understood quickly and as the last tricks they are really freaking out...I do want to say something but the pain in my throat reminds me that I can´t.

As I go through the whole rubberband routine I am debating myself to do Liquid Metal...one of my most powerful routines where patter is necessary, since works both as impulse and misdirection...

"the whole problem of the trick is that if somebody see just one move, the whole routine is ruined, and the most difficult move, requires for me to talk in order to create the misdirection" I think this while finishing the rubberband routine

"maybe pressure will make them forget about the fork trick" I think as I take out a balloon and do the universal gesture of asking for a phone, then something unexpected happen as I do the gesture, 2 girls quickly take out pencil and paper and then they give me their phone numbers...sweet!! unfortunately I am centered to Marcela now,I just take them and smile very politely since I feel rejecting their phone numbers would be very rude, then somebody gives me his cellphone and I just take it and then I execute Pressure...

"I hope this will be enough" I think as they are reacting, then my friend stumbles in and say "oh!! if you all liked this one, wait until you see the fork trick" he screams happily
"damn you!!!" I scream in my head, now I don`t have a choice...

I take out the fork and look around, I have 60 eyes on me waiting something amazing to happen,So I just prepare the loop very silently and let the fork fall on the floor, I just pick it up and do the moving fork trick, thankfully I can create my own shadow so the loop won´t show, I don´t say anything I just look around and everybody is silent, then I feel something I have never feel in my perfomances...fear...

I have never actually wanted anybody to fear me...does the silence unintentionally create this? I think it does...


suddenly some people just leave and some of them stay, they want to see more, so I start the routine, the first bend is made and everybody is freaking out, the second is made and they freak out more, the third and needless to say they keep freaking out. Now is the time of the fourth bend, the one that needs heavy misdirection, So I look around and some people are burning my hands, some of them my eyes and some of them the fork.

I start to show my sleeves and wristband to prove there´s nothing in there, while that I am doing the move and suddenly happens what I fear, somebody sees the move, he doesn´t say anything, thankfully but I can see in his eyes he catched me, suddenly I miss my voice. everyone else ae having a great time and then I bow and leave.


1:45
My home

I reflect about what has happened while I am having dinner in my house, some pork meat and milk, then my brother enters the kitchen

"hey!! it was a great night!! I had fun playing football, drink some beer and you performed in mute mode and still you managed to get great reactions, a lot of popularity and 2 girls phones, now that´s great!! maybe you should call them and hang out, I guess Marcela can wait, right?"
I just say no with my head while smiling
"ok, well then I guess that girl is great!! see ya tomorrow, Mexico vs Argentina is at 1:00 so be up early!"

I stay some minutes thinking about the silence and how affected my performance, and the fear and mysticism that caused. When I was a musician my teacher used to tell me "Music is a composition of sounds but also a composition of silences, without silence, there is no music" I remember and I think the same is applied to magic. Silence is a powerful weapon, but I must use it wisely since can I really give a full show without saying a word...I think yeah, but I feel that what I am different to other magicians, I talk to my audience and conect with them by telling them a story and asking and chatting with them.

Voice and patter not only justifies the trick, it helps connect yourself with an audience, and silence...well, I am gonna have to experiment more with it...

 

[Nino]

That was a great story Luis and I'm freaked in how you handle the sitaution.

Why do you have to put the Mexico game? That game just pissed me off. Stop refrees.

 

[SleightedMind]

Great post. I definitely will try to play with silence
Keep 'em coming

 

[Luis Vega]

Great post. I definitely will try to play with silence
Keep 'em coming

I will try to give updates every week...I really enjoy writing this...but it would be awesome if I could get more replies or comments