White noise
Through the early morning window, I peered down at the dust of snow on the asphalt and on the edges of the cars parked below. It has snowed, and I was a little dismayed, thinking that I had missed the snow of the day. However, not much later, snow tumbled down as if someone had torn open pillows of feathers, and so it has continued, much too my childish joy, all day and most of the night.
In the morning, a neighbour smiled at me as I leaned precariously over the balcony with my beloved camera. In the evening, on the phone to a friend on the other side of the world, I put out my hand and tried to catch the largest snowflakes I could reach.
Do you eat snow? I do, though more so when I don't intend to. It seems that my equatorian eyelashes are useless in this kind of climate.
I was a few minutes late meeting the artist, unaccustomed to being slowed down by weather. He kissed both my snow-flushed cheeks, then we made our way down the street for a coffee.
I have noticed a problem with cafes in general. You can have the most elegantly or stylishly decorated cafe, bar or restaurant, where even the decor in the washrooms is something to gawk at and admire, yet so few places seem to know how to manage the aspect of sound. It's not just about the right music - too often, the music is too bold, too invasive and played much too loudly. It is also about balancing the acoustics, ensuring that the furnishings of the place add to the atmosphere by subtracting unattractive noise.
A lovely place to have tea in Montreal is Salon de thé Camellia Sinensis, on Rue Emery near Saint-Denis. They played soothing spiritual new-age music when I was there, but the division of space and arrangement of furniture meant individual conversations travelled a little too far, and the calming effect of the music was lost.
Once we went to a very popular place on Rue Crescent (I forget the name) where the echoes were atrocious. Bare walls, hard floors and exposed ceilings meant sound bounced everywhere from everywhere else. The voices of patrons presented a constant murmur that made it difficult to hold a conversation; worse still was the clang of forks and knives and the amplified crash of crockery.
I can name many more places, but essentially, the problem is the same.
Today, this cafe played some pleasant jazz. A little too loud for my preference, but my hearing is more sensitive than most, perhaps to make up for my inferior eyesight and sense of smell. Outside the snow continued to fall, and in my mind I heard the sound of silence.
Down the whitened streets, past the whitened cars, whitened trees still bearing leaves, whitened people, we discussed society and art, and the act of creating. Those who delighted in the first snows exchanged smiles, though many were scowling at the cold.
In a little alley which no feet had trodden through since the morning, the snow had piled high and thick. But someone had been there before me and had thought exactly the same - he, or maybe she, had walked into the mouth of the alley, just a few feet in then out again, leaving a semi circular trail of deep shoeprints. Unabashed, I followed suit and walked a semi-circle around the existing prints, then continued on my way home.
Posted by sniffles at November 04, 2002 11:50 PM