noise pollution - inner or outer?

"Broadly speaking, any form of unwelcome sound is noise pollution, whether it is the roar of a jet plane overhead or the sound of a barking dog a block away." - quiet.org.


I'm not very good with other people's noise. A boyfriend left me because I have asked the punk in the bus leaking 'shd shd shdong shd' from his huge headphones to please turn his music down; my intolerance has caused a neighbour to place his pink plastic radio on the windowsill at 6 am blaring 'cherie fm' (and if you don't know it, it consists of endless Celine Dion diarrhohea) across the five inches between our houses; I utterly unreasonably abhor colleagues practising in the room next to me on tour and am wont to punish them by pulling hairs both from their bows and heads; the lime green scooters that rear their testosterone-fuelled ends up the delicate sand formations by our house get the eye and would get a lot more if I hadn't learned that they have the power make our lives a misery; I have walked out of the only restaurant in town and missed dinner because of piped music; I am close to filing for divorce when my dear husband leans over my shoulder to help me with a computer problem and chews his toast in my ear.....

....and now I discover - "didn't the estate agent tell you?" snigger snigger - that we are in a concentrated military aircraft zone.

I am horrible and violence, even if it is only in my mind, is often close. I'm a criminal in the making.

At the end of my jog today I decided to take advantage of the fire-light of the sun setting over the vines and the calm of the birds' evensong and sit on a wall to meditate. As if having lain in wait for me, they all came gleefully - the barking dog, the rampant teenagers on mopeds, the speeding car and the fighter jets. I managed not to react physically by turning, glaring, or sticking two fingers up into the sky, which was a triumph. My mind, however, was plotting serial killings until, as one of the scooters revved up just as he passed (and probably performed a loop the loop to get me to open my eyes), I suddenly felt a delicious detachment from it all, as if my mind has sprouted wings and could fly away and watch from above. I wanted to burst out laughing. The sense of freedom from my affliction lasted about 30 seconds.

I realise more and more that it is all in the mind, that the world is a noisy place and that, rather than be addicted to silence and be angry every time my 'right' to it is taken away, I should learn to rise above my irritation with the sounds around me and rather develop inner calm. This is why, though I am tempted to join these guys, I shall aspire to learn from these guys instead.