Neighborhood Noises

A new bark has been added to the cacophony of noise in my neighborhood. For the past three days I have listened to this poor dog barking all day long. I’ve actually stopped noticing it; only when it takes a brief break to refuel for another 5 hour stint do I notice its absence.

It has become part of the blanket of normal sounds in the background along with planes overhead (yes, I’m close to the airport), a constant whir of weed whackers (not sure why lawn mowers haven’t made it to CR), and the loud chugging of engines from my landlord’s collection of restored “classics.” Those are just a few of my favorites.

Honking is another section of my neighborhood symphony. There are all kinds of honks here and most of them are long and loud. Some are super high pitched, some sound like an old train engine, some have fancy tunes they play. They are all obnoxious.

People honk here to say any great number of things. Usually on my street it’s, “I’m outside, open the gate so I can park!” However, if the person on the inside doesn’t get the job done in two seconds another reminder is released into my air space. And another two seconds later, and another two seconds after that too.

In high school, when I would go pick up a friend I would be afraid to honk in their driveway because my parents hated when my friends honked in mine. My mom would say something sharp with her tongue about the rudeness of honking and disturbing neighbors or something like that. Nowadays, teens can just text each other from the road when they're getting close so parents don't even have to know what their kids are doing let alone worry about the neighbors.

Here nobody worries about the neighbors, no matter what time of day. It’s just, “Pura vida, I’m sure they’ll get back to sleep in spite of my abhorrent 5 am horn sounding.”

This poor dog is still going at it. My former housemate from my homestay used to talk about drugging the dogs in our neighborhood that were left to bark all day. At first, I thought she was being cruel, but then I realized what she was talking about was way more humane than the owners who just leave their dogs alone outside to bark all day long out of loneliness, confusion, fright, who knows what. Plus, it will give my eardrums some peace.

So, I guess maybe it’s time to break out the arsenic.