For the director of music

Advent psalm 1

When I suddenly became unilaterally deaf a few years ago, I realized what a sensitive algorithm our brains have developed to make use of signals from our inner ears, a kind of built-in GPS that helps us to position ourselves in space. Since the algorithm requires the data signals from two positions, i.e.two ears, I was suddenly not just deaf in one ear but also unable to calculate my position. Suddenly, without a functioning GPS and no other system in place, I was disoriented, confused, dizzy. Where was I, did I exist at all?

I was soon to discover that sound is something to which my entire body – not just the cilia of my inner ear – reacts. In stillness, silence and solitude, my body was now making me keenly aware of my heartbeat, my breathing and the tiniest tremors of my muscles and bones. As I ventured out of doors, I sometimes had to lean against a wall to steady myself in relationship to what appeared to be a bouncing sidewalk, as opposed to my own rebounding body. The catastrophe in my inner ear had affected my balance too. But even with a brick wall to support me, I was unable to defend myself against the relentless drone of city emissions or flee from all the invisible detonations. The human body has apparently evolved to react instinctively to explosive sounds, with a surge of adrenalin to propel its flight away from any potential source of danger. Plenty of adrenalin, but to what avail? Without a sense of direction, I could do nothing but succumb.
I could literally feel my body jerk and twitch to the sound of a car door slamming shut. And like a blotting paper against spilled ink, I apparently had no choice but to absorb the ultrasounds of passing traffic. I was forced to reverberate to the asynchronic pulse of pistons firing from behind a stop light. I had no choice but to confront all the palpable waves being generated when hard rubber grips the asphalt, and breathe in all the fits and starts of exhaustion.

Throughout my torso and limbs I suddenly felt what I could no longer hear. To protect myself from all the sudden intrusions, the violence and confusion of so many new signals, I knew I would have to limit my focus. I was reminded of the way blinders manage to calm a farm horse in city traffic, by curtailing side vision. Perhaps I needed a leather flap on my ears, a pilot's cap, to cut out unwanted feelings. I tried all sorts of earplugs, and was occasionally relieved, though I knew I needed more to refine my inner focus.

And so I began by focusing on the omniscient 'sounds' of my own life, those generated by my own living body, by my own nervous system. I was forced to spend hours on end in stillness and silence. I had to begin by becoming aware of the difference between all the vibrations, movements, rhythms and pulses within myself, from those generated by the world around me.

As my brain continued in vain to call for signals from my poisoned inner ear, I ‘heard’ the hiss of a snake coiled in my cochlea, ever ready to strike again. On days when I had been exposed to a lot of ambient sound, this viper seemed to become envious and hissed with a pitch that rose like a whistling tea kettle until it managed to pierce some indefinite barrier. Having managed to break through something it proceeded to gurgle and cluck, like a radiator that needed to be aired or a contented baby, depending upon how I felt. I think I have learned to interpret this viper's behavior quite well over the past few years, and though its autonomous life remains at odds with mine, I have also learned to live with it.
If my heartbeat, my pulse, and the growling and bubbling of my gastrointestinal tract are other involuntary 'sounds' of my life, then the vibrations associated with my breathing are not. The fact that I could control the feeling and 'sound' of my own breathing was my first solace after the catastrophe. I decided to focus on feeling the 'sounds' that I could make and control. I was going to let the sounds of my own body, the uncontrollable and controllable, tell me something first. Then if I could come to terms with the focus of my new inner ear, perhaps I could share my 'insights' with others.
...to be con't.