Open window

A unique concept to different people

Some organizations and companies have an “open door” policy.

I’m not entirely persuaded that I understand what that means and am definitely leaning towards the view that it means quite different things to different groups.

Here, we find that when we leave the outer door open at night, creatures tend to come into the house through the screen. Once a large one comes through, the moths and mosquitoes invite themselves in as well. As a result, we do not have an open door policy. At our house, we do have an open window policy.

All summer long, we leave the upstairs windows and inside doors open. Sometimes, the rain splashes in (though not often enough this summer) but we do get a good cross draft and, now that the maples have grown to shade the roof, we no longer have any need for an air conditioner.

Ours is a quiet neighbourhood. All night we are kept company by the song of the wind in the trees and the gurgle of the brook. It’s pretty much as close to wilderness camping as we get these days.

One summer, we had an overnight guest who also chose to leave the windows open. She lived in a suburb, not entirely away from the night-long hurry of traffic. I suspected she didn’t sleep well in our house. My suspicions were based on the fact that, at breakfast she told us, “All night long, there was this constant hiss, like some kind of white noise. Is it a machine or a recording?”

It took quite a lot of conversation and not a little detective work to uncover the source of the sound, which was one that we were so familiar with we no longer heard it: the brook! Our guest chose to sleep the next night in a hotel.

The wind and the brook don’t keep us awake, but the last few nights something else has been creeping through the screens. Yes, little rushes of chill air sneak in and make us shiver under the summer sheets. It must be time for warmer blankets or sliding the windows closed.

Still, there is something of summer left. The other evening I saw the kingfisher. It’s been months since I did. The joy that swells under my heart when I see one always soothes and calms me. What a gift, to glimpse that chiselled head. How sweet to hear the rasping call. There was no flash of blue wing. Clouds, those falsepromisers of rain, blotted all blue from the feathers. Several times the sharp-edged crown, the angled spread of wing, winked from the multiflora, as the kingfisher paused in its search along the brook. It was scanning the pools for little fish, no doubt.

And on this day of all days in this long, hot summer, how blessed I am to see it. How it filled my eyes with the happiness that this creature has chosen to reveal itself after so many weeks of fishing elsewhere. Truly awesome!