Tag: threat

Soothing or Scathing?

The kids in the swimming pool were giddy.

They took turns jumping into the water, thrashing around like sharks, and splashing each other.

I sat in a lounger on the deck, cringing.

All the activity didn’t bother me. Kids will be kids after all.

But the gleeful shrieks they were emitting? That was something different.

The shrill noise hit my eardrums like a heat-seeking missile. It caused my heart to take off like a jet engine. And it put my nerves on red alert.

I had hoped to spend my afternoon relaxing poolside, but the shrieking left me in fight-or-flight mode. It was threatening to ruin my day.

I knew there was no easy antidote for my situation. The kids weren’t trying to trigger my body’s distress signals. They simply hadn’t learned how to control their voices yet.

I would need to wait out the soundstorm.

Eventually, the kids got out of the swimming pool.

Their parents wrapped them in towels, and the whole family headed on their way.

The area was quiet, once again.

Well, mostly quiet.

One end of the pool was flanked by a waterfall feature. The sound of fresh water cascading down offered a subtle soundtrack. And it had quite the effect on me.

My heart rate slowed down. My nerves went nearly catatonic. And I was tempted to doze off.

This is the vibe I’d come here for, I thought. The waterfall noises. Not the high-pitched shrieks.

But the more I thought about it, the more absurd that statement seemed.

Back when I was learning to drive, one phrase from my instructor stuck with me.

Driving is a non-contact sport.

The idea was to promote safe habits behind the wheel. Avoiding hitting objects — from stray animals to street signs to other vehicles — was paramount.

I was in high school at the time. And while I had opted out of studying physics, I still knew enough to find this advice darkly ironic.

The everyday world, you see, is full of contact. High-speed contact, to be specific.

All around us, particles are colliding with each other. Solids, liquids, and gases are pinballing off each other with great force. And as we drive, air is continually colliding with our vehicle.

The key is to not to avoid all collisions. That would be impossible.

Rather, our mandate is to avoid the big ones — with potentially deadly projectiles, with pedestrians, and with other hunks of sheet metal on the roads. The ones whose impact is accompanied by noise.

Yes, sound is an indicator of what we’re looking to avoid while driving. It’s a marker of the contact we don’t want to incur.

And so, we react forcefully when we hear a thud or a smash. We associate those sounds with a problem and seek to remedy the situation immediately.

Meanwhile, some other sounds hardly evoke a shrug. We’re apoplectic to the roar of the engine, the rush of the air conditioning or the pinging of raindrops off the windshield.

Mastering this dichotomy is key to becoming an effective driver. But the advantage wanes when we get out of the vehicle.

And that’s a problem.

I stared over at the pool waterfall.

The cascade of water sure sounded peaceful. Yet, the sight in front of me was anything but.

Gravity was causing this rushing water to collide with the water in the pool. The impact displaced the pool water, causing a series of bubbles and mild splashes in all directions. And those violent collisions were what caused that soothing rushing sound.

The mechanics of this auditory operation were quite complex. Far more involved than those that caused a shriek to leave a child’s mouth.

That too included a violent collision, between air and vocal chords. But the invisibility of that process made it seem innocuous to even the most trained of eyes.

The disconnect between my eyes and my ears was apparent. And I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

If sound is a universal marker of impact, how have we come to categorize it so differently? To recoil from some auditory cues and embrace others?

Some of this was likely learned. But much was innate, and likely without logic.

The rush of water might sound relaxing, but there is plenty of danger at the bottom of remote waterfalls.

High-pitched shrieking might trigger alarm, but it could just be a sign of glee.

Indeed, what we find scathing and soothing is mostly arbitrary.

It’s time to stop taking it for granted.

As I lay in bed, I could hear the commotion.

Outside my window, it was pitch black. But I still could hear loud booms and bangs from nearby.

Fireworks, I thought. It was almost Independence Day, and this seemed like a logical explanation.

I paid the noise no more mind, and soon dozed off to sleep.

But should I have been so sure? Gunfire does sound a lot like fireworks, after all. And the protocol for responding to it is far different.

If there was a shootout going on outside, would I be able to identify the auditory danger? Would my fight-or-flight responses activate in time? Would I get myself out of harm’s way?

I’m not sure. And that uncertainty is distressing.

Of course, I’m far from the only person to have this concern. But while many seek to root out the cause of such a dire situation, I’m focused on better identifying the symptoms.

No longer will I allow my brain to code sounds without reproach. Innate senses are not immaculate. What scathes and what soothes might turn out to be a red herring.

Yes, I am capable of sorting through the audible markers of impact. I can identify which ones truly present a threat and which do not.

This will require some intense focus, and some challenged assumptions. It might require me to stop shrugging off the booms and bangs of fireworks, for instance. And to start ignoring the shrieking of children.

It won’t be easy. But I’m here for it.

Sound is more than a sense. It’s a tool.

I intend to use it properly.

Calm Before the Storm

I was standing on the back deck of my uncle’s house, chatting with him while he grilled burgers and hot dogs. It was a blazing summer afternoon, with blue skies overhead.

My uncle scanned the sky. Then he turned to me and calmly stated, Once this food is done cooking, we’ll want to bring it inside. It’s going to rain soon.

I was incredulous. Sure, there were some clouds off near the horizon, but they weren’t the ominous variety that screamed Rain. There were no rumbles of thunder in the distance or flashes of lightning.

Nevertheless, I heeded his warning. And 20 minutes later, we were in the kitchen, watching the rain come down in sheets where we had previously been standing.

I was in awe of my uncle. How could he so easily tell that it was going to storm when I saw so few signs of it?

My uncle is not a meteorologist. A renowned surgeon and cancer researcher, his professional endeavors take place far from a weather center. Those skills require precision, ingenuity, and many long hours in operating rooms and labs.

And yet, in his limited spare time, my uncle seemed to have developed an uncanny ability to sense the impending danger in the skies ahead.

I was only a teenager at the time of this story, and I had no true vision for my future. Yet, this revelation hit me light a lightning bolt. If my uncle could make time to understand the weather, perhaps this was a skill I could pick up too.

So, I started studying radar maps and watching The Weather Channel. I took an introductory college meteorology course for fun, and I ended up with the top grade in the class. And when I worked as a news producer as a young adult, I would constantly pick the brains of the staff meteorologists to fill the gaps in my knowledge.

I was captivated by the idea of knowing what comes next. I was relieved to know I wouldn’t get caught off-guard by shifting weather patterns. I was confident in dressing properly for the elements.

But most of all, I was entranced by the details — particularly, the moments of change. I was mesmerized by the rush of fresh air from a cold front. I was ensconced by the smell of dew at dawn. And, of course, I was awestruck by the calm before a storm.

It became an obsession. And that obsession has persisted.

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the calm before a particular storm.

This storm didn’t bring thunder, lightning, rain, or snow. In fact, it wasn’t a weather event at all. But it wreaked plenty of havoc, nonetheless.

This storm was a global pandemic.

We should have seen it coming. News of a mysterious virus plaguing China had made it around the world long before the virus itself did. But the vast distance gave many of us — particularly here in America — a false sense of security. It led us to believe that It won’t happen here.

It did, of course. And now, even with the worst of the pandemic behind us in this nation, our lives have been inexorably changed.

I am moving forward, as so many of us are. Rather than dwell on what happened, I’m picking up the pieces from a lost year.

But despite all this progress, I find myself going back to a specific time. I keep circling the weeks and months right before the pandemic brought life to an abrupt halt.

Some may think that such a focus is foolish. They might exclaim that the moment is gone now and is not worth fixating on any longer.

And yet, I see things differently.

It helps me to ask what our world looked like while we were standing on our back deck, unaware that a storm was about to blow in. It helps me to think of what we might be able to recapture from those moments.

In some ways, we were at our most idealistic then. I know I was.

In the months before the pandemic, I was battling several cross currents. I was at a career crossroads. I was ramping up programming for the local alumni chapter I headed. And I was laser-focused on getting into better shape, physically and financially.

I was living life week-to-week, but with a distant goal in mind. I’d assumed that the world would stay roughly the same over time and that I’d gradually get to where I needed to be.

All this idealism sounds ridiculous in hindsight. Catastrophes have a knack for distorting our vision in this way.

And yet, those shattered illusions might be our best guide for the road ahead.

For all its benefits in a state of emergency, living from moment to moment is not a sustainable activity. If the trauma of a pandemic — or some other crisis — causes us to give up on long-term planning, our future will be as turbulent as our present.

And yet, reverting to our old ways is no simple task. It’s a challenge to head back into the fire after we’ve been burned.

This is the crossroads we find ourselves at now, as the worst of the storm has passed. Do we take our cues from the ravaged landscape around us, or do we harness the spirit that resonated in the air before the skies turned dark?

I have chosen my path.

I’m harkening back to that moment before the chaos and reclaiming the life I’d built in those days. Some of my priorities were out of scope, for sure. That much is clear now. But even with that disclaimer, I was coming into my own back then.

I want that feeling back. I want to believe that the trauma of a pandemic year hasn’t wiped it away for good. And I will do everything in my power to make it so.

I’m sure others feel this way as well. But that feeling might be blown away by the winds of opinion. It might be crushed by the prevalent demands to build something better out of the wreckage.

I’d encourage anyone in this predicament to be still for a moment. To picture the moments before the world turned sideways. And to consider whether that setting — that life — is something worth pursuing once again.

The calm before the storm is a snapshot of doom. But it can also be a moment of opportunity.

Let’s not let it slip by.