The Man Who Fixed Radios, But Broke His Silence

My father wasn’t a talkative man.

He fixed old radios for a living in a dusty corner shop squeezed between a tire repair stand and a tea stall. Every morning, he’d leave before sunrise, lunchbox in hand, grease already on his fingers. Every evening, he’d return smelling like wires and solder, his silence louder than any conversation.

When I was young, I didn’t think much of it. I assumed all fathers were like that — quiet, distant, buried in routine. But as I grew older, I began to crave more than just his presence. I wanted stories. I wanted to know him.

I wanted to ask him why he never laughed during movies. Why he only owned two shirts. Why he always stared at the ceiling before sleeping, as if replaying a film only he could see.

But I never asked.

Not out of fear, but habit. You get used to silence the way you get used to background noise — it fades into your normal.

One afternoon, when I was sixteen, I walked into his workshop unannounced. He was hunched over a broken radio, his eyes squinting through a magnifying glass, soldering iron in hand. The radio buzzed softly, the way bees hum when lost.

I sat on a stool and watched.

“Do you ever get tired of fixing things that were meant to be thrown away?” I asked, half-joking.

He didn’t look up.

Instead, he said, “Your grandfather wanted me to be a teacher.”

I blinked. It was the most personal thing he had said to me in months.

He continued, voice low, hands steady. “But when he died, I had to quit school. Fixing radios paid faster than philosophy.”

I didn’t say anything, afraid my voice would shatter the moment.

He finally looked at me.

“You want to be a writer, right?”

I nodded.

“Then write. Don’t wait till you’re fixing radios.”

That was it.

That single conversation changed the trajectory of my life. I studied harder. I read more. I applied for scholarships. I wrote until my fingers cramped. I promised myself I’d give him something his broken radios never gave him — legacy.

Years passed. I left home, became a columnist in a mid-sized city newspaper. I wrote features about forgotten people, small acts of courage, unsaid goodbyes. The kind of stories my father never told, but maybe lived.

He didn’t say much about my success, but every now and then, I’d get a call from his neighbor:

“Your dad showed me your article today.”

“He said you used to be quiet, just like him.”

“He read it twice.”

He never said those things to me directly. But I knew. That was enough.

Then last year, I got the call I wasn’t ready for.

A heart attack. Quick. No pain. Gone before the ambulance arrived.

I went back home. His workshop was still filled with old radios — some half-fixed, some waiting. His tools were organized, his chair still warm. There was a notebook by the window.

I opened it.

Inside, were pages of handwriting. Not repairs. Not radio codes. But thoughts. Quotes. Even poetry. Some in English, most in Urdu. One page simply said:

“I gave my son silence, so he could fill the world with words.”

I sat there for hours, notebook on my lap, radios buzzing faintly around me.

I had always thought my father was a man of silence.

But maybe he was just a man of depth — speaking in static, in solder, in sacrifice.

And maybe… he was never broken.

Just busy fixing things no one else could hear.

I miss him more than I ever said out loud.

And I wish — just once — I had told him that his silence shaped me louder than any words ever could.

But maybe he already knew.

After all, the quietest people often leave the loudest echoes.