Sounds

One of my most vivid recollections of the past year has to do with my heightened sensitivity to sounds. A bird call, even a simple little sparrow tune, would stop me in my tracks. He's talking to me, in a way. How rude to not listen. Though the aural landscape is vastly different, my sensitivity continues. Sitting in my office, I'm so maddened by the buzzing and humming sounds that emanate from my computer that I find myself shutting it off so that I can make contact with the sounds outside. I turn it off between uses. I know this will infuriate the keepers of the network, who like to have continuous access to my keystrokes to ensure that all is working properly. I don't much care. For as long as I can remember, there has been a curious little gonging sound over to my left, rear field. I'd registered some mild annoyance over it once or twice over the past fifteen years. Yes. Fifteen years. I had always inferred that it was some sort of clanging outdoor toy in the daycare playground that sits three floors down from me. Today I stopped inferring. I looked. It turns out that it is the movement of my blinds against a steel windowframe, caused by the air currents of the building ventilation. I just stopped it by raising the blind by about two inches. It seems like utter insanity to have tolerated this sound for decades without exploring its source, but such is the way that attention has been focused in here onto a tiny 17" screen, my portal to the outside world. These are miniscule events, barely enough to register, hardly worth talking about, you'd think. And yet, they remind me of so much that has changed. It's a good feeling.