The sounds of Nanticoke

Nanticoke and its surroundings

A few weeks ago I had a conversation with someone at work. She and her family had moved from somewhere in New York City to a fairly isolated development in the Poconos. She enjoyed the newfound peace and quiet of living deep in a forest, while one of her daughters found the change distressing.

I told her about Nanticoke. I have lived here most of my life. After my mom died I bought my childhood home and continue to live in it. I talked about its sound profile, how the sounds around me keep me connected to both nature and society.

I have a fairly large yard, with many trees and bushes and gardens teeming with life. In the morning I wake to a chorus of birds. At night I come home to the sounds of frogs and insects. Both continue to a greater or lesser extent throughout the day and night.

When the wind blows, I hear it passing through the leaves and branches. I hear branches creak as they bend in the wind. When the leaves fall, I hear them tumbling across the lawn, sometimes skittering along the street.

The Susquehanna river runs past less than a mile to the north. I cannot hear that. But I can hear flocks of geese flying towards it, to use it for navigation on their Winter migration.

About a mile to the west there are numerous churches. Each one used to ring their bells on the hour, starting at six A.M. and continuing through the evening. Most of them are now closed, and their bells have gone silent. Half a mile south is the carillon at Luzerne County Community College, which plays music throughout the day.

A mile to the east is a small local "expressway" that leads to Interstate 81. I can hear vehicles on it at all hours. More faintly I can hear traffic on 81 itself, until it is too far away to hear.

Also to the east are a waste distribution center - not a junkyard, but a place where local garbage and recycling is collected sorted, and shipped off elsewhere. More recently several other industrial sites have been built. You can hear vehicles moving here, back-up alarms, even the occasional slamming dumpster lid.

Overhead planes fly to and from the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport in Avoca, or to other more distant airports. Sometimes a helicopter joins in, usually Life Flight off to rescue or transport someone, but other times a private helicopter or even a military flight.

A major road runs past my house. I can hear cars and sometimes tractor trailers going up and down the road at all hours. In the morning I can hear school buses carrying students to school in the morning, and back home at the end of the school day. For many years a now-closed elementary school a block from my house would spill out into their playground for lunch and recess and the air would be filled with a high-pitched keening, a static of screams and cheers and shouts. I always wondered what the sounded like up close - surely all the kids weren't screaming at once? 

A block to the east is the high school football stadium. On some Friday nights I can hear the sound of home games, the crowd and the cheerleaders and the band and, once upon a time, the sound of a cannon that would be fired whenever Nanticoke scored or won or something. I'm not around to hear it much anymore, but I haven't heard it in years. Some weekend mornings I can hear the sounds of rescheduled or Junior Varsity games, or band competitions. (This morning was one of those times.)

One Saturday morning many years ago I drove past the schools and saw, under the shade of some trees that have long since been removed, a group of bagpipers practicing. I haven't seen or heard them there since, but I always have hope.

A rail line runs through Nanticoke, roughly alongside the river. The haunting sound of a freight train going from somewhere far away to somewhere else far away cuts through the night.

As a child the lonely sound of a barking dog chained up somewhere would keep me up at night. In the summer some people across the street would set off what sounded like a string of ladyfinger firecrackers in a garbage can, which both muffled and deepened the sound. I haven't heard that in years, and I miss it.

One Spring morning I took my mom out to do some banking. When we got home, after I helped her out of the car, I stopped and stood still, listening. The neighbor's ornamental cherry trees, loaded with blossoms, were full of the buzzing of hundreds of visiting bees.

All these sounds remind me that I am not alone. That there is a world of nature just outside my door. That there is a world filled with people going to and fro. That there is business and commerce going on out there.

And sometimes there is silence. The insect and bird chorus stops. The cars and planes and trains pause. There is only the sighing of the wind, if even that could be heard.

In a few months that may be gone. There are plans to open fifteen data centers in Newport Township, a sparsely-populated region that borders Nanticoke. The sound of all the generators needed to run these centers will spill out of Newport Township into Nanticoke. The silence will be gone, and many of the other sounds may be drowned out forever. And what will I hear then?