Sounds from the Urban Jungle

It makes for a pleasant experience to be walking these same streets in the peace of midweek, mid-morning. There's something almost illicit about being out and about at such a time.

On such a recent morning, I actually stopped halfway across a park to notice a vista that I'd never observed before, despite living in this district for over a decade now. I saw the local church set against misty hills in the distance. Listening, I noticed that in this peaceful scene were two prominent sounds; bird calls and traffic. These are the overwhelmingly dominant sounds of my modern suburbia; birdsong and the ceaseless. distant roar of the M1. The all pervasive far-off din is so constant and yet insidious that I fail to even acknowledge it anymore, like chronic tinnitus.

It was almost with a shock that it occurred to me that living in the Faceless Housing Estate in a Characterless City means living with this endless roar of traffic day and night, 365 days a year! It means living without real peace. Yet, before the claustrophobic thought overwhelmed me, I noticed the more pastoral birdsong too, even here in the urban sprawl in winter. Constant and enduring. I listened more carefully: the rural coo of Wood Pigeon; the chirrup of the common Sparrow; the evocative caw of Crows, somehow perfectly suited to the bleakness of winter; other more unusual calls that this non-ornithologist cannot begin to identify. I listen back again to the traffic, unable to discern the different species; was that a Ford Mondeo or a Renault Megane, I wonder?

Traffic noise and bird song. The ear of the suburban flaneur learns to filter out the former and zero in on the latter whilst knowing that he must ultimately reconcile himself to being condemned to live with both.