Between this post and my last, I walked from home into university. And, for the first time in three weeks, that journey was made with earphones in. And oddly, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I was expecting. Seeing as I’ve lived for nearly a month without my mp3 player, I’d got used to hearing the sounds of my surroundings, wherever I was. The other day, for example, I was outside in my garden, reading all about the life of probably the best known guitar player of the last 25 years – Slash. Normally, I would never just read. I’d always be listening to music, in the background – in this case, probably a bit of Guns N Roses – just so I wasn’t surrounded by silence.
This time, though, I did sit in what I thought would be silence. But it wasn’t. Even though I live in a very quiet part of what is already a very quiet town, I was still surrounded by noise – although it wasn’t at all intrusive. The odd car going past, the sound of my next door neighbours occasionally popping outside for a cigarette, and even – at the risk of sounding a bit of a hippy – the noise of the birds flying around weren’t at all irritating. In fact, it was actually quite enjoyable to sit there and “soak up” my surroundings. Not only that; it was also nice to get away from always being able to hear music in the background, and it has made me more appreciative not only of the environment I live in but also the music that once I would have listened to just for the sake of it.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: birds, for the sake of it, guns n roses, hippy, music, slash
