Look how sensitive we have become to the sounds around us

The Boston Herald

BEVERLY BECKHAM

The noise has stopped, finally. Or is it only an intermission?

I look out the window and see the men across the street, talking together. Half the yard is still covered with leaves. They and The Machine have been working for hours. The whining, unremitting drone awakened me early, far too early on a non-work day. The sound was like pain. I wanted to run from it. But I couldn't. It filled the house. It filled me.

In the summer, the sounds never cease. I live on a main street. Trucks clatter, growl, groan. Cars rumble by. Trains hoot. Airplanes snarl. At times their noise is everything. It is all I can hear. All I can process.

Now the windows blunt the sounds. But they are out there. I can hear the swoosh, screech, throaty grumbles, the loose fan belts, the old mufflers. They are dulled like pain by Percodan, and almost bearable. In my office I am aware of them. But in the kitchen, when the radio is on, they are gone.

Except now. Now The Machine screeches again and it eclipses talk and song. I can hear it in my toes. I expect to see the windows shaking, the house closing in on itself. But the house is immune. It is inanimate. It cannot hear.

The Machine blows leaves into piles. It has replaced strong arms and strong backs, but it screams like a person in pain. It will stop in a while, and I will be grateful for the silence.

I will open the door and hear the whisper of wind, the flutter of leaves, their crinkly sound as they hit the ground, the wind chimes, the dog across the street, kids bicycling past.

And I will inhale these sounds - even the trucks rumbling past won't bother me - because I will be so relieved that the offensive, overriding noise has stopped.

How sensitive we are to sound.

In New York, they're playing Mozart on subways now in an effort to reduce tension, in the hope that music soothes the savage beast.

I wonder sometimes, when cacophony fills my world, how city people stand it. The thin walls that separate them from their neighbors and the street don't keep out the noise. Kids scream, adults shout, radios blare, traffic shrieks and there's no getting away from it. It's everywhere.

Turn it down, you want to say. Be quiet.

And yet total silence is an affront, too. I spent a night in a convent this summer, and there were no truck sounds, no people sounds, no hum of machines, no planes overhead, not even a breeze. I turned on a fan and faced it toward the wall. I didn't need it to cool me. I simply needed to hear its whir. Its sound was a lullaby.

Church bells, school bells, Christmas bells - these are good, welcome sounds. Your son's car pulling into the driveway late at night, the brakes squeaking, the door slamming - these are welcome, too.

And yet if your son's home and a stranger's car pulls into the driveway and the brakes squeak and the door slams, these same sounds are menacing.

"Hello, I'm home," can be good or bad.

Laughter is good, except when someone is laughing at you.

Crying is bad, most of the time, except when a baby is born. That cry is a joy.

Footsteps in a hospital if they belong to a friend are good. But if they belong to a technician who's about to draw blood, they're terrible.

Trills, chirps, twitters, tweets. These are all good sounds.

But bellows, whines, blares, bays are all bad.

There is nothing good about the sound of The Machine. Its chain-saw shriek cuts through nerve and sinew. It has replaced the crunch of leaves, the rhythm of rakes, and the banter of people talking and joking while working together. It gathers up leaves, but leaves in its wake something too close to a wound.