Noise

You’re driving down the road listening to the radio.

The music stops.

Commercials and DJ’s file in one after another with anecdotes and messages while you’re passing billboard after billboard and noticing advertising on passing cars and vans. Retail businesses on the sides of the road spread banners over their doors and in their windows with messages of their own.

A car stops next to you at the traffic light with its’ own music which doesn‘t match yours, so you roll up the windows and finally, when you retreat back to your peaceful abode you check the home phone answering service, cell phone messages, email and any text messages you got while driving.

Escape.

You turn on the television. Commercials bombard you with messages to Buy This! Act Now! And simply Call 1-800 where an operator will be waiting to assist you. Smile. And here you thought you were smart by avoiding the doom-and-gloom news channels - so you log onto the internet where pop-up ads and advertising line both sides of every website you visit -

So you close out the world. Or try. Even as I write this in my word processor the damn cursor won’t stop blinking.

And that’s why I retreated to the forest this summer.

Noise.

I can’t be the only one affected by the over-stimulation.