http://www.barrysbaythisweek.com/Art...aspx?e=1655219
The sounds of silence
Posted By David Coombs
The green dark forest was too silent to be real. So wrote Gordon Lightfoot in ‘The Canadian Railroad Trilogy.’ It is a glorious, moving song – and yet the line rings hollow. It is untrue. False. Not correct.
This week, I was walking through our forest about the time of night that the calendar flips over to a new day, when I heard a piercing, bloodcurdling, terrifying scream. I thought of Sarah, but realized she was back at the house. I ruled out, it being July, an April Fools prankster or a Halloween joker. I considered that an errant axe murderer had inadvertently stumbled onto our property and dispatched a victim.
I was debating fainting when a whoosh enveloped me and I glimpsed a large dark something swooping through the trees. The forest was far from silent given that my rapid deep breathing and chattering teeth could likely be heard at the highway some two kilometres away. I regrouped and tromped rigorously toward home. Reviewing my store of nature lore, I settled on owl gets rabbit. I could live with that thought, but nevertheless quickened my pace. Owl gets man did, I admit, cross my mind.
Halfway home, my ears twitched. Then my heart nearly stopped. A rasping nasal buzz emanated from the darkness directly ahead. It appeared to come from the ground. Suddenly, it was on my left, then right behind me. Surrounded by a herd or flock of nasal-buzzing monsters is quite unsettling, especially at midnight in a supposedly silent forest.
The eerie buzz moved higher into the canopy, then suddenly ceased. No animal leaps that quickly from ground cover to tree perch. It had to be a bird! Of course, the elusive nighthawk. How could I have been so stupid? Only a nighthawk; that made two of us out at the witching hour.
An isolated, ancient cedar trunk lay in its grave beside the stream just ahead. During the day it is my favourite bench along my sylvan saunter. This particular night, it provided a welcome spot to sit and recover. The supposed silence was proving deafening, not to mention deranging. These forest sounds were not simply going in one ear and out the other. They stuck in my head, rattled around and reverberated into my heart chambers.
I still had a good kilometre to navigate before reaching the safety and silence of the bedchamber. I decided to confront the noises, accept their existence, perhaps even enjoy their presence and move on. I did not budge. Learning to accept the unknown is not in my nature. I want to know the hows and whys. I appreciate there may be several explanations for an event, each vying for legitimacy, but I must grasp one. When I cannot settle on the solution or discover a reason for a phenomenon, I resort to faith. If I cannot say I know, then I say I believe. But if I am speechless, I am paralyzed.
All very profound and interesting, but I still had to move my sorry, shaking carcass along the road. Not just because I yearned for home, but because I was damp. The cedar log had soaked up considerable moisture from the sprinkle at dusk and had left its mark on my derriere. As I tried to pierce the ghostly gloom enveloping the road ahead, I realized the cloud-covered sky had decided to shed some of its burden. It was raining.
Soon it was pelting down. Not the comforting pitter-patter of rain drops on leaves, but the cascading roar of water drenching the trees, the bushes and me. At least I knew and understood these sounds. I also understood thunder. The clap nearly knocked me over. I wish it had because I might have missed the bolt, which ended the life of the white pine just ahead. Instead, I saw, heard, felt and became one with the flash, the crash and the smell. I would have been transfixed, but I shook so much, I bobbled and wobbled. I did not get on my knees, but I did babble a few words to my maker. This silent forest was proving particularly loud.
I decide to quicken the pace. Heck, for the first time in years, I ran. Dashing along a road through the green dark forest, silent or otherwise, in the middle of the night, is not a recommended exercise. However standing, staring at a smoldering, shattered pine, is also not suitable protocol, especially when lightening dispels the darkness again and again. I emerged from the forest 200 metres from the home front, battered but not sunk.
As I pulled the covers up to my chin, I nestled into my pillow and closed my eyes. Then the dulcet cry ‘whip-poor-will’ flowed through the open window. Over and over again.
I realize I have been wrong. Lightfoot is right on. A silent forest is not real.
"Too silent ... to be real" good for a chuckle - article
