My head was full of voices. The voices of the complex characters of the book I’ve been editing for the last month. The voices of the characters of my own work-in-progress, the four protagonists jostling to be heard. Real life voices from my volunteer work; voices from the books I’m reading or listening to, voices from the tv shows I’m watching. Family voices. Friends. I needed silence.
Today dawned windy and cool, a day stolen from fall. The foot pain that’s been plaguing me for the past two weeks has gone, rest, exercises and new orthotics doing their job. A day for walking, then. (Not too far, so I don’t aggravate the foot again.) It wasn’t until early afternoon I actually escaped my desk for the Arboretum, hoping the cool, occasionally showery day meant it would be fairly empty.
It was. I walked the internal trails, rather than the perimeter, which is always busier. A house wren chattered at me; indigo buntings and redstarts sang from cover. From the canopy, a red-eyed vireo repeated ‘see me see me see me please’ over and over. There were no voices, human or imagined or electronic.
I saw a couple of people, exchanged quick ‘hellos’. The only other mammals were squirrels. I took pictures of wildflowers: in this regenerating old-field ecosystem, they’re the immigrant flowers of southern Ontario: Queen Anne’s lace, birds’ foot trefoil, vetch, clover, ox-eye daisies.
When I reached my favourite bench, with its view over grassland and bushes, I sat. An eastern kingbird hunted insects in graceful swoops. Butterflies flitted from flower to flower. A crow called. Bees buzzed; a chipping sparrow echoed them with its tree-top trill. No one disturbed me.
I didn’t sit long, maybe fifteen minutes. My mind stayed quiet. Has stayed quiet, so far. Tomorrow there are characters to listen to again, and friends, and the ambient hum of the cafe where on Mondays we meet to write and then have lunch and talk. It’ll be fine. Because today, there was birdsong and wind.
Random Ramblings 