it’s warm enough this October that i can hear crickets at night through my bedroom window. cheep cheep. they sing through the evening, through the night. their chatter reaches me, i am kept company.
crickets sound by rubbing rough patches on their wings together (and hear through ears on their front legs, can you imagine?). scientists say they sing only for three reasons, calling, courtship, and aggression,1 but how can anyone really know why anyone else sings? they also sometimes make their music with leaves…..2
i learned a while ago that one root meaning of window is breath-door. in the case of my3 crickets (and other cases) the window is also a song door.
if we were talking about humans, this might be redundant because singing is a kind of breathing for us.4 not so for crickets. i digress.
in addition to cricket songs, windows also let in light. they let in breeze. they let in other sounds. (plant) nourishment, ventilation, conversation. music blares out the window of the car rolling by, i recognize the song, i’m lifted. windows offer change, perspective, room.
i forget that breath has a lot to do with living, living long, lasting through the night and the years. there are breath-doors, song-doors in the walls we’ve built. there are breath-doors in the life i build too, i insist. determine how much light or air i want, adjust accordingly. notice who has me breathing easier and stick around. notice what has me breathing easier and crack it open, let it crack me up.
https://study.com/learn/lesson/crickets-chirping-overview-facts-types.html#:~:text=Crickets%20chirp%20through%20stridulation%2C%20the,a%20scraper%20and%20teeth%2C%20together. ↩
https://elifesciences.org/articles/32763#:~:text=Male%20tree%20crickets%20produce%20sounds,leaf%20edge%20before%20short%2Dcircuiting. ↩
i say “my” in the sense of fondness / belonging as opposed to possession…. ↩
this video is supremely adorable and made me smile and giggle lol ↩