I'm in a Borders' Bookstore, enjoying a Javakula, which is like a Frappacino, which is a blended cold drink with some coffee in it. Anyway, I hear a baby screeching over to my right and I look to see what's happening. The little one seems okay; she's with her mom and the mom doesn't appear too concerned.
Now this baby was making quite a bit of noise there and after checking out the kid, I looked around at the folks in the cafe. Not one even noticed a baby was cryin' it's head off. I guess some or all of them heard the baby crying, but not a one looked up or in the direction of the tyke.
That reminded me of being in an office in midtown Manhattan a few years ago. I was on the second floor. It seemed every 20 or 30 minutes a very loud siren would pass by. I guess they could've been police, firemen or rescue/emergency personnel. But if I recall correctly, no one in the room noticed the siren.
Hmm.
If you live in an area where sirens are going off so often, I imagine it's easy to become immune to them. Maybe even to the point of not hearing them. That would be a bit tough for me. Each one of those sirens represents something non-optimum. If someone's being chased for going through a red light, that's one thing. But another siren may mean a person's hurt, perhaps dying. Or someone's house or place of work is on fire.
Okay, I realize I sound like a bit of a softy here. And if I lived in an urban area for years and years, then the sound of a siren may very well not reach me other than, "I wish that loud sound would stop so I could hear myself think."
But I think there's a significant amount of life that comes around and then passes us by without our noticing. And I think we've become, to a degree, immune to certain pieces of life. Maybe that's good and allows us to handle the rest of life more easily. And maybe the more we confront all of the many components of life, the more easily we'll be able to handle the "rest."
Well, that's what I've got for now. Just a bit of musing from a Borders' cafe.
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