I had one good ear that afternoon, and it let me hear Golaski’s voice. What I also heard: the brush of my feet in grass and dry leaves and the pops of breaking twigs. Wind: the stop and start of it you can’t predict, or control. Skittering insects, chirps of forty birds, fifty clicks, chitters, squees, throat clearing, a rusty hinge squeal, a piping, pinched flutes, calls like a finger on a wet glass, return calls. The green insect almost too small to see— you couldn’t make out its shape, just a speck of green… the sound of lake water lapping a shore, the coos of doves interwoven with less familiar birds, the harmless buzz of insects with beautiful names: nyenje, usubi, nyuki.
— John Cotter, Losing Music: A Memoir (Milkweed Editions, April 11, 2023)
Book Review by Lisa Zeidner titled “In his moving memoir, John Cotter anticipates a world without sound. ‘Losing Music’ offers readers a compelling portrait of what life is like with the rare and incurable condition Ménière’s disease. (Washington Post, April 12, 2023)
so touching and heartbreaking
yes…
Not sure why I’m in tears…and yet.
yes…
very nice descriptions
agree…
Sounds like a moving read, pal. That faint sound you just heard? Another book hitting the bedside table reading list…. 😉
🙂 I’m about 1/2 way in Lori. Not ready to recommend yet but closing in.
What a beautiful way to experience life. It’s sad that most of us take all these things for granted, until we lose them.
And that’s the punch line Laila