Listen Up

The past week or so I have been working on being a better listener. I hear a lot, but listen poorly. We are assaulted by the din of traffic or the noises in our heads, the cacophony of our culture that clamors for our attention. To hear nature, to hear our inner self, to hear the still small voice, I want to listen closer. I want to be aware of the deeper voices, and the voiceless, the Whovilles that fill our lives yet go unseen, and unheard.

With the intention to listen this morning, I drove to the parking area on the side of the road south of the Deception Pass Bridge. It was oh-dark early, the bridge workers not there yet, even the daily commuters scattered sparsely along the highway. I parked and walked cautiously to the top of the trail leading down to North Beach. A freshening breeze greeted me, a chilly southwesterly, with a gray wall of clouds scudding off the Strait. I zipped my coat higher.

As traffic noise faded out behind me, Pacific Northwest music filled my ears – waves and whitecaps, wind in the firs.

I walked out onto the sweeping stretch of sand at the eastern end of the beach. No bird flew in this wind, no songbirds sang in the forest, no sounds at all save the waves off the Strait and the wind pushing them shoreward.

The tide was low, but rising. A lone deer had wandered along the beach during the night, leaving its footprints like a story in the sand. Great herons fished in the shallows, wary of me, and then flew away as I continued in their domain.

I got to West Point just as the sky began to color. Small tidepools beckoned me to explore, so I did, finding crabs hustling along the bottom, and a microcosm of communities all within the span of a hand.

I wandered over to the amphitheater where two nights before a bluegrass trio had entertained us with their sharp blending of harmonies and instruments. All was quiet this morning other than the breeze in the trees, a blending of different instruments and harmonies.

I walked along the forested trail to return to my car. A lone fisherman cast into the water and retrieved his lure to cast it once again. I heard the crunch of gravel underfoot, becoming an echoing thud as I crossed a footbridge in need of immediate repair. Park staff closed the trail an hour later to do just that, to replace the planks of the bridge. What timing!

Rather than follow the forest trail all the way back, I went onto the beach again, retracing my steps, walking on gravel and sand in the slow rhythm of my stride. I ducked into the woods to see the old smaller shelter. I climbed over the rocks leading to Little North Beach to find another fisherman with the entire cove to himself. I nodded a greeting to a young couple dancing at the tide line.

Then I began the ascent back up to the top, to the highway, to the construction and congestion, back to our normal life.

I paused. I looked back over North Beach. I heard years of memories of my being here so often before. I heard the voices of ancestors who still wander this beautiful land. I heard the cry of the seagull, the croak of a raven, the sounds of the sea, carried to me by the rising storm and the changing seasons of today and millennia past. I heard patience and peace.

The universe speaks in the wind, in the waves, in the squawk of a heron or the silence of the spheres. It waits for us to listen. There is something within each of us that hears the song of eternity whenever we take the time to listen.

What do you hear?

jack

Directions: Work on the Deception Pass Bridge makes access to North Beach from the bridge area a bit of a challenge. The parking lot is closed, but there is limited space on the side of the road just south of the parking lot. It's far easier, and safer, to drive one mile south on Highway 20 to the intersection with Cornet Bay Road. Turn west into the park, and follow the signs to North Beach.

Transit: Island Transit has a north-bound stop near the Deception Pass store just north of Cornet Bay Road, and a south-bound stop just south of Cornet Bay Road. Enter the park and follow the road to North Beach, a little over a mile away.

Bike access: Highway 20 has almost never-ending traffic, with mostly narrow shoulders. I don't recommend biking along Highway 20, but many people do.

Accessibility: The trail at the west end of the North Beach parking lot is accessible for many with limited mobility to get to the top of the beach.