A(drift)

I'm not going to bore you with the "what" and "where" of how I came upon the sound of the seagulls. Rather, I will tell you that it made me realize that I was disturbed on a visceral level by how much I take things for granted. In order to get this recording, I crept into an all but abandoned parking lot, and laid down underneath a truck. I positioned the microphones, one toward the seagulls, and the other behind a barrier. Had the circumstances been different, and, say, the truck moving and on the road, I imagined that this would be just about the last thing someone saw and heard before they were run over. A sense of peace washed over me, and I would have stayed long minutes more, had a flash of headlights not interrupted the moment. When I arrived back home, I wrote this short piece that was inspired by this moment.

"It was me on the road.
But you didn't see me.
Too many headlights on.
But none near here.


I ache to go where I already live.
I yearn to be who I already am.
I write words that never appear.
I grab the wheel I cannot steer.


This thing inside,
Murky and thick like tar
It looks at me under the surface
like crocodile eyes.


Let me lie here and lie.


I am fine."

The following are some other sounds I found interesting during my drift. I tried to ignore the ambient noise and instead concentrate on the "hidden" sounds within the area. I hope you enjoy them.

Click below to hear my recording of seagulls. It was at 11:17pm on March 6th, 2012.  

Gulls 
 The duration of the seagulls is 1:40. The sound was recorded here, near the Potawatomi Casino.

Cars...
 The duration of this car is around 0:51. The sound was recorded at 9:36pm on March 6th, 2012, here by the Fifth Ward Lofts

Gas(Station)
The duration of the gas station is around 1:50. This sound was recorded at 10:12pm on March 6th, 2012, here at the Mobil Station.

Part of learning usually includes subjecting yourself to things you wouldn't ordinarily do. It is through new experiences and the way they relate to old experiences that we gain a different perspective. (Not to sound too cliche about it)
For the next portion of this class, we are to go on something referred to as a "Drift". It is a drift because we're drifting away from the normal hallways that comprise our lives, and instead walk to places we've never been. (Usually because our daily routine doesn't require it.)
Since a key part of this field recording assignment specifies that we must go on a walk that is separate from our "will" or "choice", I decided to use the Fibonacci series to determine which direction I go.
For those of you that don't know, Leonardo Fibonacci was an Italian mathematician who published a series of numbers that pattern after the addition of two preceding numbers, starting with (0,1). So 0 + 1 = 1. 1+1=2, etc. The series is 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13...
So with that in mind, starting at the front door, I will flip a coin to see if my first direction is left or right. If it's heads, I'll go right. If it's tails, I'll go left. I'll then use my watch and walk for one minute, and then turn the opposite direction that I began with. After three minutes, I'll turn again, and so forth. The idea is to create a pattern that is outside my normal activities, in the hopes of arriving in a new area of the city, and capturing some interesting sounds with a mini-disk recorder. Since it's difficult to get accustomed to the sounds of new areas, I will continue this pattern for 4 hours.
I hope that I will be able to record unfamiliar sounds in somewhat unfamiliar territory, and also see if the Fibonacci series leads somewhere interesting.