The Last Sit: What might silence this sound? (Week Eleven)

I have come to the friendship bench for the last time this semester (since I will be on leave in the spring, for the last time this year).

What might silence this sound?

It is not surprising that the leaf blower (I think of it now as a single leaf-blower, which has bedeviled us all semester, moving continuously on-and-around campus) is still making a racket. That sound is the one invariant,  from our sometimes-bracing but generally-pleasant experience of sitting outside this semester, which I would like to banish from my acoustic repertoire.

Why are these leaves being blown?

Why must this process be so noisy?

What might silence this sound?

It is surprising that, in the interim since my last visit, most of the leaves have fallen from the trees around the friendship bench--which means that, for the first time this semester, I am sitting in direct sunlight. It's downright warm today, December 3, 2012--and so very, VERY pleasant to be here. I've removed my coat (not to mention the long johns I wear all winter, most winters!), and am sitting comfortably in a light sweater.

What might silence this sound?

The falling of the leaves, from the trees and shrubs, means that all the houses on Millbank Road, and all the other suburban houses that surround the campus, are also now quite visible. In September, I could imagine that I was in the forest primeval. Now it is clear that I'm in a tiny spot of woods, sandwiched in the middle of the suburbs.

What might silence this sound?

It makes me happy to realize that none of the leaves in these woods will be blown by  mechanical means; they will break down and return to the soil, in their own good time, not keeping to the tune, or timing, of our human schedule for leaf-removal.

What might silence this sound?

What is also more visible now is the lay of the land: where it dips down and rises up. There is a valley before and behind me--the first separates me from English House, the second demarcates Millbank Road. So I can clearly see that I am sitting here on a "high hill," my own "Bryn Mawr."

What might silence this sound?

As I rise to leave, I notice that the leaf blower that seemed to be just across the rise has ceased…

and picked up again just a bit further away. I wonder if it is the same machine….?


What might silence this sound?