No trains are running. The black-and-white warbler’s quiet wheeze competes only with the distant vuvuzelas of rubber on road.
train
February 1, 2010
Wind and water, scattered chirps of winter finches, the sound of two freight trains going through the gap: exactly the music I needed.
December 15, 2009
Dark clouds. Steady drum of meltwater. A locomotive with the low note of its whistle stuck open like a bagpipe drone moans through the gap.
November 24, 2009
Rain and fog with raven: silent, just above the treetops. White-throated sparrows and a freight train whistling at the same pitch.
December 10, 2008
Rain and fog. Only the low rumbly sounds break through: a jet, a train. Sitting in the dark, it’s almost possible to believe in isolation.
November 23, 2008
October 22, 2008
Quiet except for the wail of an eastbound freight: Grazierville. Tyrone. Plummer’s Hollow. Then wind and darkness, coffee bitter in my cup.
August 19, 2008
I’m beginning to distinguish individual locomotives by their whistles. The majority merely say Look Out, but a few almost manage I Am.
July 29, 2008
A bat swoops past my face—a puff of wind. The interminable whistle of a train creeping toward the crossing. A sliver of moon.
March 10, 2008
Gray sky, and the air is lousy with snowflakes. The usual birds are making the usual chirps. A train whistle, horrendously out of tune.
March 2, 2008
Clear, cold, and very quiet. A distant train whistle is picked up and repeated by a screech owl. The incremental progress of the moon.
February 22, 2008
Siren, train whistle, a red-bellied woodpecker ululating in the yard. It’s snowing. Squirrel tracks cross the porch in front of my chair.
January 15, 2008
Not all natural sounds are pleasant, not all industrial sounds are ugly: the train whistle sounds so much better than a scolding squirrel!
November 9, 2007
A doe trailed by a scrawny 5-point buck. The soundtrack includes a train, a raven, geese, a wren, and a low-flying plane with a wide eraser.