Sounds From a Neighborhood

The sounds of a neighborhood vary day to today.  As I write this, it is a Monday, my day off normally, but not for most people.  I don't wake to the neighbor's car leaving for work, a large stand of trees between this place and hers.   I wake to the alarm clock, warm some cornbread to be served with maple syrup for our breakfast, then sit down in the office to contemplate the day after Partner leaves for his job in the city.

I'm surprised how quiet it is outside, the kids all inside the local Catholic school. Mom's back home to tend to the children not yet in school or to work, Dad's off at work, the retirees in the neighborhood, staying inside, out of single digit temperatures.  Off in the distance the wail of a police siren.  The ground is hard and knotted, the houses stare silently forward, not acknowledging anything that exists in their peripheral vision. The morning light falls down upon their steps, without sound.  That lack of sound does not seem odd, it is simply Winter.

In Summer, the neighborhood takes on a whole other depth of sound.  There is the bright, disorderly cry of lawnmowers firing up, the small tidy yards of an older neighborhood, not taking all day to mow, but the precision of their care reflects on the owners pride in their home.  There are no homeowners association rules, one neighbor's bright purple door standing out at attention, but with the colorful flowers that normally adorn the front and the deep rosy hue of the brick, it suits the house.  There are a couple of kids on bikes, zooming up and down the sidewalks, as off in the distance their dog barks for their return.  In the distance the sound of church bells, there in the month of brides, paced faithfully and serene, the sounds of the bells like shafts of light among the soft green leaves, yellow butterflies flicking on the grass like flecks of sun.

The sounds continue into evening, a summer shower off of the lake, releasing the scent of flowers into the damp air, crickets sawing away in the grass with a sound you can almost feel as a tickle on the skin,  There is the wave of a neighbor, as they take in the paper,  the clink of a couple of glasses of mint julep, there in the small traveling island of silence that follows us to the front porch.

There is no formal neighborhood watch here, but we do.  We notice when the newspapers pile up at someones house, and check to make sure they are OK.  We watch out for one another. We note the strange car parked on the street, a teenage boy just stopping to visit with the pretty teenage girl down the road.

We know who has had a new child, by the toys that sprout in the yard, like colorful flowers, and we note when a house grows silent, a sign gone up for a quick sale, the owner having passed away, time consuming not just courage but muscle and bone, until nothing was left but a frail form draped in a white sheet, like a piece of furniture unused.  We didn't notice the exact time of leaving, but can't help but speak of the remains.

The house behind has been silent for a long time.  It's a tall, well kept place but with no bathroom on the main floor, and wiring that has seen more than one great War, it's not going to sell quickly.  But it's being maintained, other neighbors tending to the yard as the realtor tends to the inside, as we watch for the day a moving truck comes in, and bread is baked to take over to welcome the new neighbors in a house that will once again, live and laugh.

From the floor in my little office, comes a rumble, a growl.  There is no one on the street, no person walking past.  Yet four minutes later, the UPS struck arrives, the dog can hear it even as it makes it's turn from the main road onto this little side street, a canines super hearing that can detect his arch enemy the UPS truck or a crumb dropping in the kitchen.  He barks ferociously at the driver, who, through the glass window, simply smiles, knowing that roar is a black lab with no will to bite. I open the door for the box, a rush of cold air coming in, the front room now smelling of trees, as it goes silent again, the dog turning around twice on the couch, before drifting off to sleep again.

A bird blows onto the sill, like a bright scrap of paper,  his heart pumping in his throat, faster than any pulse.  He looks into the house, then away, then into the glass again, as if listening, only to dart away as the clock chimes on the hour, then ceases.  The chime fills the whole house.  Perhaps it's just sound, or perhaps it's  all time, grievance and grief, manifesting as sound for just one instant, as planets and gears align. It's a moment, wherein one bird believes he is immortal, and in that instant, perhaps he  is. Only when that sound  stops, does time come to life and by then, he is gone.  

The only sound now, that of breath and the tick of that old clock.  I don't deliberately listen to it, the ticks seemingly beyond the realm of hearing, then in a moment, with that one tick your ears respond to, you are acutely aware, of the long diminishing train of time you did not hear.  How many ticks in this house in a hundred years.  How many after I am long gone?  Yet, I feel the presence of others that have lived here, for they perhaps aren't truly dead, but simply were worn down by the minute clicking of small gears. The echo of those that sat in this room, do not disturb me, they are part of this house, the sound of wood, the creak one of murmuring bones, the air that taps on ancient glass,  speaks of deep winds that witnessed more than time.

I had planned on another country home, but my heart took me here, this quiet village in the shadow of a big city, an old house I fell in love with the first time I entered it.   It has sights and sounds that I would have missed out on 100 acres, it has noise and neighbors and a number of reasons not close, but out there,  that means a gun safe buried deep within a wall.  But I'm a short drive to many  friends, a walk to a little Polish bakery and a good Irish Pub, the cheery "hello!" as neighbors  spot a familiar face coming in for a pint or simply a mug of good tea and a hearty bowl of stew.  On the return walk  home, the windows light up like sunshine, as I stomp my shadow into the steps, happy to be home.

At the end of this day, the shop growing cold, I take a quick walk before dinner.  As the neighborhood ticks outside, a slow and steady beat, comes the sound of the trains, the tracks a half mile away, carrying a sound on the air that is as comforting as childhood.  I watch the movement that is static serenity and labored exhaust, a click, click as it moves away,  through eternal trees, faded to thick sky, the train displacing air.  What is that formula about the displacement of air?  Or was that only  in water that Archimedes of Syracuse calculated human displacement of.  I put my hand on my hip and only displace air.  Reductio ad absurdum, the absurdity of human logic where a two pound piece of forged steel on a hip weighs more than the form carrying it.

Shadows lengthening, I hurry on back to the house. The tick of my watch and the sound of the train fade away, as if running through another place, someplace far from where this life ended up. I approach the little bungalow, a sheen of ice on the porch, the empty lattice by the porch, the front guard of circumstance waiting for summer flowerings.

It's the last place I ever expected to live, but I am blessed to be here.  I ascend the stairs, the air smelling of trees,  clutching the old key to the back door, there on a little ring with a train etched on it.  In the growing dark, I don't really see it, but I feel it, there in my hands, clutching that little anchor to a life in a small village, a life unexpected, but as welcoming as home..  The house sighs as I open the door;  I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror, moving away from the mirror into the warmth, my form darting out of the mirror,  the sound, tick, tock, tick, breath that breathes life back into this old house.