I know it’s not correct grammar. I know it’s a double negative. I know it calls into service that most criticized of English juxtapositions. I know it betrays me and surfaces my semi-hidden blue-collar origins.
I was taught better, but I find myself returning to it. I was raised on it, so I’m not surprised when the truth and validity of this old saying often surface from somewhere beneath my rational, educated, taught-to-be-better parlance.
Bob Newell
In my growing up days, someone would likely use this phrase to express the impossibility of enumerating something precisely, as in “There ain’t no tellin’ how many mosquitoes are out tonight!” When one wanted to criticize a fellow for his lack of proper business ethics, that one would say something like, “There ain’t no tellin’ how many folks he has snookered!”
The expression was used both to indicate one’s lack of exact, final or complete knowledge on a subject and, also, one’s inability to accurately describe it — to “tell” it.
And now I’m about to contradict myself by talking further about this unspeakable phenomenon. If this phrase means anything at all, it says plainly that talking about it, putting words into service in its direction — this is an impossibility. If it means anything at all, it means there is no human way to know and to try to speak it; it is a fool’s errand. And yet, I’m about to walk down that dark, dusty road. If I couldn’t or shouldn’t speak it, what makes me think I can say it now? Ain’t no tellin’
“Stand silently flabbergasted by life, if you can or if you must.”
Don’t be shocked or startled when you find yourself stupefied. Stand silently flabbergasted by life, if you can or if you must. Even if you feel bowled over by the truth of it, it’s ironically a humble learning in humility. My word to you on this day is to look away from proper grammar and claim the usefulness and functional enhancement of this old, tired phrase.
That’s because so much in life is beyond both comprehension and elocution. As a boy preacher, a college debater, a preacher, a teacher, an after-dinner speaker and a wordsmith with many miles on my mouth and brain’s odometer, I am telling you there are times when it is best not to try to speak.
Much of the good stuff is admittedly beyond accurate description, much less complete understanding. Often, we are caught trying to decipher the depths of the experience and its enigmatic code of meaning. When we are at a loss for words, we might just be most close to this cave of hiding, flashing, fading realities. Why must we forcefully push words out into the open and disturb the unadorned beauty of silence?
When your best friend dies and you are without speech, remember this truth. Ain’t no tellin’.
When you see the sunrise over a familiar rooftop, but just can’t muster a sufficiently complete verbal prayer of gratitude, keep your heart open and, for this moment at least, your mind and your mouth closed. Ain’t no tellin’.
When you hold a newborn baby, feel the softness and sense both the potential goodness and the likelihood of damnable, systematic disappointment, hug, hold on harder and have a cry, if you need to. But hush your mouth! Ain’t no tellin’.
If life kicks your butt, but you get up the next morning, ready to go again, hit the road, but with no pitiful or self-serving commentary. Ain’t no tellin’.
If you stumble into lots of good and you look for greatness, be quietly grateful. Ain’t no tellin’.
If you have a sense of calling, find your deeper purposes and become successful at doing “your thing,” the best way to activate is on mute. Ain’t no tellin’.
The times in our lives when we should be silently awestruck in the presence of unimaginable mystery just might be more numerous if we slowed our pace, lifted our gaze and lived by an unspoken vow, with a sense of expectancy.
When we sense that “actions speak louder than words,” heed that wisdom and hold your tongue. Maybe, just maybe, this old crusty saying gets close to what the wisdom prophet ironically meant to say when he mused about “a time to be silent and a time to speak.”
Ain’t no tellin’.
Bob Newell has served as a university professor and administrator, a local church pastor and a cross-cultural missionary. He and his wife, Janice, now live in Georgetown, Texas, and he serves churches as transition coach and intentional interim pastor. They were the founders and remain advocates of PORTA, the Albania House in Athens, Greece.