Does anyone else like lying in bed while someone else tinkers around the house? I love those noises. I’m not sure what the deal is, but lately, listening has been comforting and grounding. Maybe it’s a throwback to childhood, when I would lay awake, looking at the crack of light the door makes, listening to my Dad shuffle the newspaper. I have a roommate now, and I like to listen for the creaks on the stairs and the clinking of dishes she makes when I’m in bed.
I started thinking about this more in the last couple of days, since coming home to visit my parents. I feel so comforted, listening to the sounds of the house at night or in the morning. The plinking of cereal into a bowl, the grinding of the coffee maker, the cats meowing, my parents trying to figure out TurboTax, my mom’s fiddle music, and the sound of the garage door. I leave my door cracked so I can hear the noises better. The secret is out. I like lying in bed with my dog listening to house sounds. I should put that on my online dating profile.
So, as I sat down to write today, I was thinking about all of this. I wanted to find some meaning, or perhaps some message that the universe of noise was trying to tell me. And I sat. And I listened to the wind chimes outside the window. I listened to the cars, as the noises changed with their distance from me. I heard a clock that I didn’t know my parents had. I heard my ears pop. I think that I spend so much time trying to figure everything out that I must have stopped listening to a degree. Just listening to the relatively quiet sounds of a house suddenly felt so beautiful and interesting.
Instead of coming to a conclusion on how this is all making me feel and why it’s something to pay attention to, I’m going to leave you with this question: What can listening do? What can it change or move? I’m wondering how this awareness of sound could affect the way I listen to people and stuff like that. This week, between now and next Friday, I’m just going to listen more. Maybe you try it too? That way, when I tell you how it went in next week’s post, you can tell me how it went for you. Are there good sounds? Bad sounds? Does music count? I don’t know the answers, but I’ll be listening for them.
xo
mistakes by the lake 
In a yoga class, the instructor told us to think of the noises we heard in savasana (passing cars, foot traffic, people talking, sometimes arguing, the pipes whooshing with water, other people breathing) as the universe carrying on around us. And to think of ourselves as rocks in that steady river of noises moving around us. To ground ourselves, to hold on tight. That’s always stuck with me. It helps me sleep in our very noisy downtown apartment. It makes me feel present to be aware of the universe carrying on around me.
xoxo-
Danielle
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