”A campfire wouldn’t be as exciting if it were silent.’’ Diane Ackerman A Natural History of the Senses
Did you hear that?
It’s April slamming the door.
May is a gentler word. A gentler month. A month of possibilities. Days of Maybes.
The rain slips down the dark sky, symphonic currents of vertical streams. The neighbour’s dog punctuates the smoothness of before-dawn morning, the groans and sighs of distant traffic, with let-met-in barks. Occasional planes coming in for landing rumble louder over the house when clouds stage a sit-in. A car shuffles off early to work, the brakes whining in protest at the top of our hill.
This month I’m changing the pace. I’m slowing down. I’m listening.
I’ll be listening to the shy parrots who’ve just found our bird feeder, to the nocturnal possums sky-jumping from the lilly pilly trees to our corrugated steel roof and pounding the length of the house like greyhounds. I’ll be eaves-dropping on conversations and paying more attention to the sounds in the world around me.
To the music of Australia.
To the sounds that I take for granted. The sounds that anchor me.
And I’ll be looking inwards: listening to my heart and my intuition and sharing it with you.
May is a month of listening and reflection.
Tell me, which sounds wipe away your anvils of responsibility?