I swung my legs out of bed and sat up. Still the sound was there, almost imperceptible but nonetheless intrinsic to my bewitchment. It was a low tone, so low that it seemed to be a corrugation of sounds vibrating at a slow but continuous rate. The curious effect seemed to travel from the lounge, along the hallway and through the open door of my bedroom. Intrigued, I got up and walked to the door. The hallway was bathed in the same grey light, and I realised I'd forgotten to draw the curtains in the lounge before retiring to bed. So in a timid but adequate illumination, I moved across the hall and into the front room of the house, half expectant (through my absent-mindedness the previous evening) to find the television set still on and the screen emanating an impermeable landscape of snow and that strange low tone in flickering rhythm. But the TV was off. I looked to the four corners of the room, to the dead hi-fi, to the electrical sockets and the lights. Everything was still, inactive. Only until I caught the view out of the window did my roving eyes rest. I took two steps closer to the glass and looked above the houses and heard it, no – saw it – so clearly, as if my whole being was at once fixated by an almost visual sensation. Beyond the blackened pavement streets and below the flannel sky, the hills called out audibly in the empty night.
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
Hill noise
It was when I awoke early Tuesday morning that I first became aware of their calling. It was still dark outside, and the tired grey colour of the sky seeped in through the blinds. I couldn't sleep. My mind was sharp and lucid, as if I'd lain there awake the entire night. It was not that my head was filled with worrisome thoughts or some pressing topic. I was simply awake and very aware. What confounded me more so was my lack of frustration with being conscious at such an hour, even though the reality that I would soon have to rise for work was clearly apparent. After lying there for a few moments, my attention was arrested by an extremely quiet but vital sound. At first I thought it came from within, as though an inner awareness had arisen of some deep biological rhythm echoing through the canals of my body. However by placing my hands over my ears I could cause the sound to cease, and from this I surmised that the walls of my apartment had colluded with the source of the sound to foist upon me a devilish hoax. I swung my legs out of bed and sat up. Still the sound was there, almost imperceptible but nonetheless intrinsic to my bewitchment. It was a low tone, so low that it seemed to be a corrugation of sounds vibrating at a slow but continuous rate. The curious effect seemed to travel from the lounge, along the hallway and through the open door of my bedroom. Intrigued, I got up and walked to the door. The hallway was bathed in the same grey light, and I realised I'd forgotten to draw the curtains in the lounge before retiring to bed. So in a timid but adequate illumination, I moved across the hall and into the front room of the house, half expectant (through my absent-mindedness the previous evening) to find the television set still on and the screen emanating an impermeable landscape of snow and that strange low tone in flickering rhythm. But the TV was off. I looked to the four corners of the room, to the dead hi-fi, to the electrical sockets and the lights. Everything was still, inactive. Only until I caught the view out of the window did my roving eyes rest. I took two steps closer to the glass and looked above the houses and heard it, no – saw it – so clearly, as if my whole being was at once fixated by an almost visual sensation. Beyond the blackened pavement streets and below the flannel sky, the hills called out audibly in the empty night.
I swung my legs out of bed and sat up. Still the sound was there, almost imperceptible but nonetheless intrinsic to my bewitchment. It was a low tone, so low that it seemed to be a corrugation of sounds vibrating at a slow but continuous rate. The curious effect seemed to travel from the lounge, along the hallway and through the open door of my bedroom. Intrigued, I got up and walked to the door. The hallway was bathed in the same grey light, and I realised I'd forgotten to draw the curtains in the lounge before retiring to bed. So in a timid but adequate illumination, I moved across the hall and into the front room of the house, half expectant (through my absent-mindedness the previous evening) to find the television set still on and the screen emanating an impermeable landscape of snow and that strange low tone in flickering rhythm. But the TV was off. I looked to the four corners of the room, to the dead hi-fi, to the electrical sockets and the lights. Everything was still, inactive. Only until I caught the view out of the window did my roving eyes rest. I took two steps closer to the glass and looked above the houses and heard it, no – saw it – so clearly, as if my whole being was at once fixated by an almost visual sensation. Beyond the blackened pavement streets and below the flannel sky, the hills called out audibly in the empty night.
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