The tiny beep beep beep

Nov. 17, 2022 After 17 years of visiting, working and occasionally living in India, I find myself relating to the place more like home than a temporary visit.  I’ve been in Agartala for 3 weeks this time around and haven’t written a reflective word.  And then, yesterday afternoon, I took my daily walk.  Most often I walk in the cool, quiet morning, but this walk occurred in the humid, happening afternoon.  As I dodged motorcycles, side-stepped holes and cow piles, gave way to the cows themselves and barely avoided the trucks and school buses, my ear caught the sound of a tiny horn, an old rubber bulb type with a noise that makes you expect a clown.  Almost lost amongst the screams and cries of the bigger vehicles, the fancy trumpeting of automobiles and the insistent autorickshaws, this brave little squeak reminds all of the other road inhabitants that it, too, deserves a bit of space.  As I walked, I couldn’t help but think that this squeaky beep fascinates me.  How does it wend its way through the crush of vehicles that take up so much more space?  Its voice, so to speak, is really only noticeable when nearby.  It’s a voice that speaks to me.

As the professional world around me often seems pre-occupied with recognition and awards, I find myself drawn to those little beep beeps that seek a little space of their own, a chance to be heard and included. Their voice is so rich with possibility, so genuine in their excited desire to get involved.  While sitting in a slightly humid studio space in a city in North India that is unknown to most of the people I know, watching the young artists explore a new scene for a play we’re devising, I try to imagine the young rural school students who will attend our performances.  Three years ago I was in this same situation and got to experience one of the most joyous moments in theatre I’ve nearly every had.  The young artists performed our play at a local school for an auditorium full of children, whose reactions nearly drown out the actors!  The enthusiasm thrilled the young artists almost as much as the play did the children.  And now, again, we will present our original creation in Hindi to a theatre full of children who mostly speak rudimentary Hindi, reaching across the gap to welcome the many voices in that hall.  I cannot imagine a greater, more genuinely moving, reward.  As I sit in the dark, I revel in the multitudinous little beeps beeps fulling the room.