This is the Sound...

I have a ton of things to write, including, but not limited to, a wrap up of camp post, a post about my room at home and what I found there last time I was actually in it. This is a post about sound. Specifically some of my favorites that warm my heart as of late.

I got the topic of thinking about this as I drove away from a few short hours with my family. We had last been all together (eight kids, two parents) since last May. We were able to relive that for two hours.

My brother drove me to Blairsville, where we met Angela who would give me a ride back to camp. I had not even spoken to Andrew since April so as the minivan leaned against the pull of gravity around the curves of my mountains I was struck by his voice. I was momentarily captured by the evenness of his tone and the thoughtfulness that I find in the spaces between his words. His voice has a good resonance, but it is not so deep you feel like you're standing at the bottom of well listening to it reverberate down to you.  It took the space of a year or more not hearing it to take note of the brilliance. This has set in me a determination to pause long enough to hear the beauty in other's God-given voice boxes.

Laughter is another one of my favorites. Taylor, my co-Head-Counselor, is hilarious and we are both easy laughers so we spend a significant portion of anytime together laughing. As I sat in the staff lounge adjacent to our office I heard him start laughing and it made me smile before I even thought about it. Any sound that familiar almost instantly puts me at ease without even trying.

Similarly we have a guy on staff who has the best man-giggle in the world. When Owen gets going laughing hard, everyone has to laugh with him. His laughter best transcribed would be, "A-hoo-hoo-hoo, A-hoo-hoo-hoo, A-hoo-hoo-hoo." It's fantastic.

On the last Sunday a group of us central and support staff went up to field two to hit around a baseball. I am not fantastic at doing that but the sound of the baseball hitting a bat is one of the most satisfying sounds.  When a ball is really nailed, everyone within earshot gets to participate in the feeling of victory.

I love the sound of simple piano melodies. Any music is fantastic, but something about a uncomplicated melody on the piano stirs my emotions and whisks away my unease.  (One of my favorites is here, the Chuck/Sarah theme from Chuck. Skip to about 1:00 mark to hear it).

I like the tap of the keys on my keyboard as I type. I like listening for the changing speeds as my fingers move faster or slower across their white plastic surface.

I love the sound of an orchestra tuning their instruments before beginning a show. The dissonance of so many types of instruments coming together in preparation for the organized music usually inspires me more than the coming show.

I like the sounds of quiet, and by that I meant the sounds that emerge when there is quiet. The sound of the breathing, in and out. The sounds of a squirrel running around the branches of a tree. The sounds of bugs crawling in the grass. The simple "plop" of a fish jumping up out of the lake to catch a surface bug. The drip of a faucet. The whir-clack-whistle of a refrigerador.

I love the sounds in a hug. The security of peace and quiet that surrounds you as you embrace each other. Even tears and sobs are muffled and safe within a hug, it's own little protective bubble.

I love the sound of opening a new pages of a book. The stiffness of the pages and the necessary breaking of the binding.

I like the sound of cards shuffling.

I love the sound of a large group singing. Not a chorus, or a choir, just random people singing whatever part they can reach.

I love that every person I know has their own set of sounds to love. Your voices, your laughing, your breathing, your crying, your sleeping, the sound of your footfalls.

What are each of your favorite sounds?