Night Sounds

I don’t remember when I started listening to the night. Some of my most vivid childhood memories are of lying in bed, on the cusp of sleep, and listening to the world outside of my room.

When I was five or six,I spent a summer with my grandparents. They had put my bed out onto the breezeway right under the windows. I remember one night after being put to bed I put my nose up to the screen and listened to the sounds in the field below their house. The night was hot and humid and full of the stillness of a summer evening as fireflies flickered through my grandpa’s tomato plants. From across the field, a train passing by seemed so loud and clear I could hear the clack clack of the wheels on the rails. The diesel engine roared as the whistle blew to warn passing cars; one short whistle, one long – woo, wooooo. We had just ridden the train from Austin, TX to my grandparent’s and I wondered if our train had passed by the house on this set of tracks.

Today, that field behind my grandmother’s house has been filled with condos and my grandmother and aunt have moved into one of those new homes. When I sleep at their house I can still hear the trains on the exact same tracks as I lay in bed. Now, their whistles are muffled by the hum of the air conditioning and the closed windows; one short whistle, one long – woo, wooooo. The sound has the ability to transport me back to that hot summer evening in my bed on the breezeway

As a child, we often went on camping trips with families from our neighborhood. At bedtime, I loved to lie in my sleeping bag and listen to the grown ups sitting up late into the night. The flames of the fire would produce the occasional pop and send up crackling sparks into the darkness. A loud comment or laughter would rise above the mutter of conversation. Across the campsite, another parent check on their children; z-z-z-zip as they opened the tent, z-z-z-zip as they closed it. Someone would open a cooler and dig through the ice to get a drink and eventually I’d doze off. Later, I’d partially wake up as my parents came to bed. Z-z-z-zip as they opened the tent, z-z-z-zip as they closed it.

Now, I’m one of the grown ups sitting around the campfire. After dark, I put Lyra to bed in her tent before heading back over to visit and chat into the night. Z-z-z-zip as I open the tent, I blow her a kiss, z-z-z-zip as I close it. Later, as I snuggle into my sleeping bag, I listen to the low mutter of late night campers in nearby campsites and the crackle from their fire.

When we were in India, one of our hotel rooms had a set of French doors that led onto a veranda. I had carried a chair outside to sit and read my book in the cool night air. Next door to our hotel was a Catholic church where the mass and homily were broadcast on the loudspeakers out over the neighborhood. I listened to the preacher saying the mass in Hindi and the microphone would pick up the background sound of the congregational response. Even in Hindi, you can recognize “Lord, hear our prayer.” Off in the distance, a mosque started the call to prayer and somewhere was the sound of drums, chanting, and dancing. As everything quieted down and the evening turned to dusk, the tree above my head erupted into the loudest chorus of cicadas I’ve ever heard. Wzzz-wzzz-wzzz-wzzz. It was magical. I had just looked up from my book to enjoy the stillness of the settling darkness and then in unison the entire tree began to sing. I closed my book and sat there surrounded by the chirping; Wzzz-wzzz-wzzz-wzzz.

Here in Dubai, I love the sound of the early morning adhan (call to prayer.) Since the first prayer is before sunrise, the call these days is coming at around 4:15 in the morning. Many mornings I wake just enough to hear the chanting in the distance. Allah akbar, allah akbar (God is the greatest.) I love knowing that I have another hour before I need to get up. We have two mosques near enough to hear the prayers. I always stay awake long enough to hear both of the muezzins. One has a rough, gravelly voice and the other has a lyrical “Gregorian” style to his calls. Sometimes, I’m still awake 15 minutes later when they broadcast the prayers, but usually I’ve drifted back to sleep.

At Lyra’s bedtime, the final call to prayer is chanted. Allah akbar, allah akbar; one gravelly voice and one lyrical. Lyra looks at me and says, “It’s time for me to be asleep.”