The Silence and the Noise

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You miss the silence when you live in a city. Noise surrounds you, pressing in on you, constantly swaddling you in a shroud of sound. Babies cry, competing with too-loud TVs, while phones ring and sirens scream and people shout to be heard. The sound muffles the real world, as our world becomes what we hear through televisions and radios and telephones. You long for silence, you miss it. You wonder if it still exists out there, if any part of the world still experiences quiet.

So you leave the city, go just beyond the suburbs. Countryside unfurls around you, and you see the world anew. The universe turns down the volume on life. A sudden panic grips you as you wonder if you've gone deaf. Do you still exist, if you hear no noise? Does the world still exist, if it produces no sound? The panic subsides when birdsong cuts across your paranoia. The clear melody, warbled with such finesse, soothes your mind like a lullaby from Mother Nature herself. You hear the roar of blood in your ears, and feel truly alive. You do exist, and for the first time in a long time, you are not a product, producer or victim of the noise. You are simply you, reconnected to the universe. Thoughts drift into your mind, you feel creative. You feel alive.

But a part of you misses the noise, the hubbub, the constant stream of sound. The noise was a comfort, a constant companion. It walked with you in dark places, and dampened idle worry with its onslaught. Out here, the silence feels lonely. You are alive, but you could be the only person alive. The noise proved other people surrounded you, but the silence forces you into isolation. Do other people exist if you cannot hear them?

So you return to the city. At first, the noise feels threatening, and it overwhelms you. But you settle into the cacophony, and escape into the mindless chatter of shouted adverts and one-sided mobile phone conversations.

It doesn't take long to miss the silence.

The AudioBoo Bug (How I Was Bitten)

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In this hot, sticky summer of mosquitoes and other flying nasties, I have been bitten. Oh yes. By the AudioBoo bug. Ha! Bet you thought I was going to say something else. Well, it's true. And it's all the fault of two very lovely ladies (and very talented writers), Annie Evett and Jodi Cleghorn. I kept seeing their tweets about this AudioBoo thing, and when Jodi suggested I check it out, I duly do so. After all, I like to keep up with what's going on in that vast, and often bewildering landscape we call the Internet.

For those of you who are as yet unaware what this whole thing is about, AudioBoo is basically a website (and iPhone application) which allows you to post short audio files. You can either do as I do, and record them on your computer using a microphone setup, or you can record and post a Boo direct from your iPhone (or Android phone). It's an extremely accessible and simple process, requiring little hardware, and none of the fancy set up required by decent podcasts (though if you want to do a podcast, I suggest you go and follow Emma Newman's blog - she's no stranger to the whole business since she's podcasting her debut novel, Twenty Years Later).

People use AudioBoo to discuss all kinds of things, but as a writer, it's a boon as it allows you to 'discuss' ongoing projects, read snippets of fiction, or simply connect with other writers in a new way. Blogs are all very well and good but there's something almost sterile about them. Sure, they take the format of the written word, our weapon of choice, but so often writers end up missing out on that spoken, vocal spark that comes from talking about projects. Now you can chat about your work to people other than your friends and family!

I also think AudioBoo is also beneficial in that it forces you to use a different part of your brain to articulate your point. Vocalising thoughts is a very different process to articulating them using the written word, and as such it can help you to have all kinds of insights into your own work that you might never have had if you hadn't chosen to actually talk about them out loud. So far, I've done an initial introductory Boo, a second Boo in which I discuss my plans for my Tales from Vertigo City serial, and newest Boo in which I discuss my current projects. None of the Boos are longer than four minutes, so you'll probably be able to listen to them and digest the contents faster than you'd be able to process one of my blog entries!

I certainly won't be abandoning my blog any time soon, but I'm hoping to post Boos fairly regularly from now on...come and have a listen to my odd accent over on my AudioBoo!