Sounds of the Night

 

Sitting on the front porch with my head tipped up towards the sky, I breathe in the cool air. The sun has set and the sky has darkened. After a warm day filled with chores it feels good to sit and relax, to look up at the bright orange star Arcturus and a few stars of the Big Dipper’s handle. The trees are silhouetted by the brightness of the dark sky, a bit of an oxymoron but yet still true here in my suburban neighborhood. My chair is positioned so that it blocks the bright light on my neighbor's front porch but still my yard is illuminated by its glare.

    I had made the mistake of looking over at it when I came outside and I still am seeing a dark blob as I look up at the sky, it's getting better, and I figured in a few minutes my eyesight will be back to normal. Slowly the dark patch shrunk, and more stars appeared.

    A train had just passed below the house. The heavy sounds of the engines preceded the loud, piercing blare of its whistle. Passing behind hills and around the curves of the valley, the noise of the engines was soon lost with only the clanking and squealing of the cars behind. Soon that was also lost as the train moved north. Quiet, if you want to call it that, had returned.

    Fireflies flickered in the evening’s darkness and a few more stars appeared.

    Cars can be heard on the highway, muffled by the distance yet magnified by the silence. Tires whining and building in volume denote trucks, and like the train, are soon lost as they follow the roadway. Above, an airplane splits the darkness of the sky with its flashing lights and a little after, splits the quiet with the noise of its jets.

    A bright spot appears in the western sky, slowly drifting towards the end of the Dipper’s handle. It is the Chinese space station, Taingong. Approximately 250 miles above me it passes without a sound. I turn to watch it drift into the east and am hit once again by my neighbor’s light. Blinded I get up and move to a shadowed spot where I can see the station as it moves past Vega and then through Cygnus. It slips behind the trees and is lost to me. Mentally I wave good-bye to the six astronauts on board, “Until the next time!”

    Sitting back in my chair I look up at the stars again. Nothing is moving but yet, everything above is in motion. Their distance hides the movements from my mere mortal eyes. Watching further, fireflies flicker, adding some perceptible motion to the canvas above me.

    I sit and remember other times I’ve sat under the night sky. The sounds came back; crickets and cicadas in the spring, deer creeping past and snorting when they see me, the howls of coyotes off in the distance, their pups yipping along with their parents. The sounds of a near-by stream as it gurgles in the darkness, a few yards from my tent, soothing me before I bed down. The sound of the snow softly falling on a cold winter night, accompanied by the crunching of each footstep I take. These are some of the many sounds that make you feel one with nature.

    The noise of the cars and trucks on the road has faded into the background, for the most part un-noticed now. The cool air feels good against my bare arms. Somewhere behind me an airplane’s engines announces its presence; I don’t bother turning around to look. Arcturus has slowly drifted closer to the dark tops of the trees and when I look back again, it has dropped behind them, hiding from my gaze. A car door slams and a horn toots as the car doors lock. I can hear my bed calling to me, quietly but yet still noticeably. I ignore it and continue looking up, thinking about the day gone by and about the new day ahead. The night here is far from quiet, but at the same time, it can be so soothing and peaceful!