Sirens

Sirens!!!

I live about 1/8th of a mile off Interstate 35 in Central Texas.  About a mile north is a large regional hospital.  I’m in a community of about 50,000 people - on the north end of the Austin Texas metropolitan area.  

So, I hear sirens frequently.  I wish I was able to distinguish the call better.  I think I know the emergency sirens, the fire sirens, and the State Troopers stopping speeders siren,

As I understand it, the word “siren” goes back to the Greek - where Sirens were three mermaid-like creatures with lovely songs that sat on rocks just out from islands in the Meditteranean Sea.  They lured sailors passing on ships with their lovely voices and music.  Seemingly their voices (and looks) were enchanting to the sailors.  The sailors, entranced by their songs would sail onto the rocks and drown.

“The Sirens were encountered by the Argonauts who passed by unharmed with the help of the poet Orpheus who drowned out their music with song. Odysseus later sailed by, bound tightly to the mast, while his men blocked their ears with wax.”  (https://www.theoi.com/Pontios/Seirenes.html)

But, modern sirens are almost the opposite - in most cases, the sirens are used to scare people away from the “rocks” - or to scare them away from the emergency vehicles.  “Pull over - get out of the way - we are on our way to a fire - or to an accident - or to the hospital.”

The one almost exception is when a squad car is behind you with the siren flaring and the lights flashing - and that means you are to pull over - and may mean you are getting a ticket for speeding - or for some other offense.

There have been evenings where there are multiple sirens - which I think might be a more major accident on the Interstate highway.  There are fire trucks and ambulances rushing for the accident, plus squad cars directing traffic.

*****

So what sirens might we have in our lives?  

Let’s start with safety.  Sirens in our cars as we start to switch lanes in an unsafe manner (or we are falling asleep at the wheel).  We have fire alarms in many buildings and schools.  We do have individual fire alarms and smoke detectors in our houses.

How about the other alarms - alarms that wake us up.  Kitchen timers telling us to remove something from the stove.  How about smart stoves that can detect that some item is done (yes, I left a pan on the stove while I was checking my email the other morning - and burned up my morning oatmeals.

How about mental sirens.  More a moral siren in our brains when we are going to do something stupid or immoral (like having a sexual affair).  A siren when we are cheating somebody.  A siren when somebody is cheating us.  How about a siren (that might be like a ‘still small voice’ just before we open our mouth and say something inappropriate.  Another siren could be for our ears as a person is starting to swear or tell a story that is not suitable.  A siren for our eyes?  Another for our lips?

Maybe we do have such sirens in our heads - some moral compass that is fixed in our brains.  

We can say mean things - but our siren says - that is not true and it is not nice to say that.  Or, I am going to make a cutting remark - our siren says - “show love - not judgment or hate”.

Maybe even a ‘stomach siren’ - coupled with our eyes - as that last slice of pie is calling out to us - to say ‘no’.

Do you have mental sirens (or moral compasses)? Can we fine-tune them to keep us loving and forgiving?

Hugs!!!

Karen