The Sound of Wakefulness

By Ives Pisgah

TUESDAY, MAY 18:

My name is Philip Tanner. I was one of the last stationed marines in Afghanistan. I never saw any action, and when I returned to Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, I was uncontained. After my active duty contract in the marines, I joined the International League, volunteering in Ukraine. My mother had passed away when I was in high school; having no siblings, I never knew my father-other than he’d been MIA since I was in the womb. Tetherless, I was prime soldier material. My troubles with sounds developed after I returned stateside.

The shock of combat, that I’d tried to prepare for as well as any human can-and no human truly can-was a chapter of life I’ll never truly be able to turn. But witnessing the souls of so many ripped from their bodies, seeing so much annihilation of humankind; it wasn’t what began this inability to sleep. The sound-like the buzzing whistle of mortars, or the shrill whirr of a drone; distant yet imminent. The volume of that wretched sound was akin to a mosquito’s; just loud enough to ruin any semblance of peace and calm. Working security in a hospital here in Raleigh, North Carolina, I’d hoped the constant connectivity, the continuous wakefulness, would help me adapt to civilian life and all the noises it entailed.

But the ICU corridor was hell: every ventilator sounded like a drone's fan blades. Gurney wheels over laminate tile floors were distant missiles incoming. So, my doctor, a VA shrink, had me start keeping a journal. Something I could look back on over the days…weeks...and see progress. But he also told me about a certain trend that I might find helpful; something he’d recommended to combat veterans dealing with triggering sounds and post-traumatic triggers. He explained to me that ‘death cafes’ were groups of the bereaved, or those preparing for a loved one’s departure; who gathered at pubs and cafes for a night. They provided resources, support. It turns out, so my shrink asserted, that preparing for death involves a lot of tactile triggers, including sounds.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 2:

Odd Joe’s Coffee hosted a death cafe night, from 6-8pm. A handful of hipsters haunted the place, but it was clear who came for the event: older folks, and boomers dealing with the slow and drawn-out deaths of their parents. A lot of retirees and those wishing they could retire were guilt-laden with having up their parents in nursing homes. Then in he ankled: Death Doula Raman Hodges.

He used to go by Gary, before becoming enamored with Tantra mysticism and converting to Hinduism. He stayed behind with me till the place closed at nine, and eagerly listened to all I had to flush. He genuinely seemed empathetic. He talked like a hippie surfer from the ‘70’s, using a lot of ‘mans’ and ‘brothers.’ I noticed too, as I was sharing a tale with him, that he had a surgical scar, on the side of his face in front of his ear, down to his neck. He wore his gray and brown hair up in a sort of bun-way bigger than was fashionable; and tied with what looked like home knitted yarns. He wanted me to share something sincere, something of depth with him, I knew. So I told him about Yuri, how we were running by cover of the trench; blind firing at entrenched Russians not fifty feet away. I saw a small blot in the corner of my eye. Against the birch and pine trunks, I saw a drone carrying some sort of cluster frag. And then I heard it; the whirring sound of its wing blades. Yuri's face was gone, but his intact body was in convulsive tremors.

Maybe, Raman, occasional get-togethers at coffee shops to share grief and loss wasn’t the most helpful prescription for what I’d experienced. As Gary, long before this Hinduism death doula thing, he’d served in the Marines, too. Looking down at his gathered materials on the table, tapping as if in hesitation, he opened the folder and slipped out a mauve piece of paper from beneath a stack of myriad random papers. “Never tried it; a step further down the death and dying rabbit hole.”

“Eliminate trauma and stress with ASMR at the Kerr & Sons Family Funeral Home and Cremation Services, Thursday Night-hosted by Thanatologist Kevin Guinn.” Raman explained that death and dying was a rapidly emerging field in America; in fact, Dr. Guinn was a leading voice in this movement, a man whom Raman knew personally. I told him I’d attend on Thursday. And the response from Raman was deadpan. “I’ll go, too.”

THURSDAY, JULY 3:

Not knowing what to wear to such an event, and having just gotten off from my shift at the hospital, I decided on keeping black cargo pants and changing the logo collared shirt with a minor league baseball tee shirt and trucker cap. There were only a few cars in the funeral home’s parking lot, and it was 5:27 in the evening, just three minutes before the flyer said the ‘class’ would begin. There were few enough cars in the lot to be only the employees of the funeral home, I worried, as I entered the large stuccoed building’s side door. The immediate rush of scented air freshener hit my senses; covering up the more mundane smell of continuous disinfectant. The bell that chimed as I opened the door made my muscles involuntarily flex; I didn’t like it.

The dark green carpet was complemented by glaringly maroon walls and floral upholstered couches. It was a foyer, ending abruptly into a hallway. In a flourishing golden frame was a sign on the wall reading “Reception” with an arrow pointing leftward. What the reception area of Kerr & Sons Funeral Home consisted of was two desks in front of a door with an “employees only” sign placarded on it. Two men sat, both in funeral-black suits. They were friendly in a reserved mode, the way parents are to the parents of their kids’ friends. An older man rose in greeting. “Hello,” he said with a slight twang. I saw on the golden name tag clipped to his coat pocket that he was a Kerr; "Randy Kerr-aaahhh-are you with the ASMR class with Dr. Guinn here?”

I nodded and smiled in my best mask of cordiality and introduced myself. Professor Kevin Guinn had a very soft voice, like one would assume a therapist to have. He blinked his eyes in slow, long clasps; to the point which I wondered if he would open them again. His handshake was firm, though in his mannerisms there was an off putting flamboyance. He gestured toward a chair for me to sit down at, told me to pull it up close to theirs, and offered me coffee. I politely accepted a foam cup of bland black coffee.

The professor wasted no time in talking about precisely what this ASMR stress-reducing class would cover. He gesticulated his firm-fingered hands in undulating motions, and in his soothing monotone, I picked up a weird type of dialect; one I couldn’t quite place. I thought at first he spoke with a slight lisp, but it wasn’t that. I couldn’t place it; it was a uniquely American flatness. He didn’t have much time to describe to me the point of the class;

Raman Hodges arrived at 5:34 according to my phone. He greeted the professor and the limping funeral director with all the familiarity of established acquaintances. “Please, don’t get up my man!” Dr. Guinn said that we’d wait for a few more minutes, for any latecomers. The funeral director then announced that some of his staff would be present, and not to wait to begin the class for them as they might be closer to 6 p.m. The professor then continued filling us in on what we’d be doing for this ‘class,’ going into some detail about how autonomous sensory stimulation can rewire our brains’ distribution of dopamine and oxytocin. In fact, the professor went on, entering into a calming state, just before drifting into unconscious sleep, is when our fine motor skills are most attuned and apt. He asked me if I’d ever twitched suddenly, uncontrollably, at a fleeting dream sequence of needing to move. I told him I had. He said this was called “automated coordinated musculature response, or, ‘ACMR.’” We are primed for this ACMR just before our own deaths, he said, and at every moment just before falling into our microdeaths; sleep.

The professor probably spoke on for some ten minutes about this relationship between ASMR and ACMR, until it became clear that in fact, no one else would be joining us. We made our way down the main hallway, where the professor said he’d begin with a set of tuning forks on Raman and I.

Dr. Guinn, Raman and I walked into the first parlor on the hallway’s left: “Parlor A.” It looked like a standard room in a funeral home: aside from the sleek new black monitor in one corner, the forest green carpet was accented with leather armchairs, matching sectional couch; a lectern in a corner with an open guest book and a box of tissues. Dr. Guinn asked Raman and I to make ourselves comfortable as he got some of his equipment.

A peculiarly gorgeous woman came back in with the professor; an employee. She wore yoga pants and a blouse, covered by a suit coat, her name tag read “Lisa Drew.” She was helping the professor set up what appeared to be massage cots-thick upholstered boards with built-in pillows. I was instructed to lie down. Lisa then folded my arms across my midsection. I kept my eyes closed per his instructions, as I inhaled Lisa’s perfume; whether it was gaudy or first-rate, it was better than air freshener and disinfectant. The doctor began softly describing the tuning forks he was gently tapping, and I felt myself losing wakefulness. I met the oblivion of black dreamlessness.

I grunted into waking life, and a blackness greater than my shut eyelids. I jumped up-and planted hard into something right above me-something velvet covering something brutally solid. And noise itself was absent; like covering your ears underwater, I heard my own breaths like subwoofers. My first screams were not out of anger, or mere shock, but I think of wanting to ensure my voice was audible to my own ears. I screamed pitiably, probably shamefully for a marine to ever sound; I shrieked for help.

“It’s okay, Philip, I’m right here,” came the voice of Lisa. I heard the voices of others, muffled and incoherent. “I’m letting you up-you’re all right,” she said. Amber orbs flooded my desperately groping eyes suddenly, as the top lid of a casket was opened. I shot up, and saw I was in whatever passed for a chapel in a funeral home: a few pews and an A-frame ceiling one one sid of me, a raised pulpit on the other side. As I jumped up out of the casket I was in, the bier toppled over. Apparently casket-viewing setups aren’t designed for the body inside to hop in and out.

Dr. Guinn held up his hands apologetically. He swore that it was I myself who’d voluntarily gotten inside a casket. I saw four older men-Kerr & Sons employees, ankling back towards the wooden doors of this little chapel. Lisa urged me to trust this doctor. “Where’s Raman?” I demanded. They said he’d not fallen asleep, and that he was going to the intermission part of this class. The four gray headed men seemed to pay no heed to me, and the doctor stressed I could leave, but implored me to stay. “Didn’t you get a wonderful sleep experience?” Dr. Guinn asked. “How long was I out for?” My adrenaline still surged. “Less than thirty minutes,” Lisa answered. She looked at me, her eyes searching me for some modicum of understanding. She angled her head ever so slightly, furrowing her brows. I asked about the ‘intermission,’ and the professor deferred to Lisa. “Follow me.”

We walked down the hall towards the foyer I’d first entered. Lisa and the professor and I were behind the four men who’d made their way past the reception desks, and opened the “employees only”door. They presently walked down the stairs behind it. And Lisa stopped, because I had stopped, and I looked at the fading light outside the foyer door. At the intersection, I could go right and head home-but turning left would take me to the intermission; with her. Were it not for Lisa, I know with confidence that I’d have briskly left the funeral home to my waiting hatchback in the parking lot. But that’s so often how it is, the lure of a girl’s stelliform stare.

“This is where all the embalming takes place,” she said behind her shoulder to me, as I noticed Raman Hodges leaning against the door frame of the open lit room. I noticed then, Dr. Guinn, walking past; he was limping, favoring his right leg. “Come on in, y’all,” said the voice of Randy Kerr inside. There were four embalming tables, but only two covered with white sheets, hiding bodies beneath. And then I heard from Randy, as he began speaking, that strange accent, that flatly American, soft voice that almost sounded as if a subtle lisp were in certain words. “Y’all ready?” Enthusiastically, the four old men cheered-I looked at Raman, at Lisa; both looked pleasantly expectant. And with a mellifluous, yet stiff-fingered hand, Randy Kerr plucked an edge of the sheet on the embalming table, just by the corner, and yanked just an inch or two down. Gushing erupted from the men.

“Ooooh! -More!” They were acting like men at a strip club! As another man held up a dollar, Randy inched the sheet further down; further revealing the gray head of a corpse. The eyes looked shut, and as the sick striptease continued, down to the gaping open mouth, I couldn’t discern the gender. But I couldn’t stomach another second. I glanced disgustedly at Raman as I made my way in the direction I should’ve taken as soon as I crawled out of that damn casket. Raman had been smiling. Lisa called after me. As attractive as she’d been; she was thoroughly fetid now, or so I felt. She kept hissing “Philip, you can’t leave!”

She was soon joined by Dr. Guinn, and Raman The doctor was giddy as he implored me that I must, in fact, stay. I cursed them all. “What you’re all doing has got to be illegal as all hell! You’re all sick! Twisted!” I yelled. Lisa countered that they were all familiarized with death, that this was how some of them showed their ebullience. Perverted maniacs! And abruptly, Raman made his case. I felt my blood scalding in my veins as I turned round to face him. I’d shared things with this crackpot bastard; battlefield memories! “Philip, please-listen: you were chosen to be here-don’t you get that by now?” I did not.

He continued: “This-all this,” he gestured with his arms all encircling, “this is solely for you. We’re all with Uncle Sam, man; me, Lisa, Randy; those four Vietnam vets in there.” Lisa was nodding her head as I swore at them to shut up. I approached Randy then. He held out to me his dog tags, and began spouting his specific regiment, his MOS number. “This is all part of Uncle Sam’s basement project-and He’s got somethin’ up his sleeves that will change the world forever, brother.” I knew then, I knew that I’d not be storming out up those stairs, back to the car. “We sought you out, Philip-you have the most recent fighting experience, you’re physically and mentally a specimen-”

I cut her off, warning her not to patronize me. But I was so famished to know what was happening.

“You, and many others like you around the nation, Mr. Tanner, are going to begin the next epoch of warriors!” Randy Kerr said this as he walked into the hall. “It is not just the heightened skills, more than brawn and ferocity,” Randy said, creasing his brows and turning his head at ever so slight an angle.

Lisa walked back towards him, limping, relying on her right leg. “Shared consciousness is what has brought you here, my man,” Dr. Guinn said, leaning apathetically against the plain white hallway. “Don’t worry,” Raman said, “I was in the service too-Air Force though; where the eggheads tend to go-commissioned as an E4.” I mean, I was,” Raman said, gesturing to the professor.

“It’s the new community of human civilization!” bellowed Randy Kerr, his arms outstretched as a composer.

“You’re lucky, son,” Lisa said softly. “Some of us underwent experimental operations, off-the-record surgeries to even get to this point.” Immediately I looked to Raman Hodges’ face. The face nodded. “Sacrifices were indeed made, Philip.”

“Invading each other’s thoughts?” I was perplexed. "No, no, no Mr. Tanner-this is a community, and with any community, there is ubiquitous trust. We simply knock. We’ve been knocking since Ukraine. But now, you can finally make sense of the whirring, can’t you?” Then I heard the sound, now before me, now behind and beneath me; I was in it.

SATURDAY, JULY 5:

Well, I haven’t been working at the hospital, not for a bit. But I don’t need it now, man. I’m looking at myself, and it’s something anyone would notice; enjoying this open cosmos of the infinite human network of neurons; this is consciousness itself brother. I’m mega-stoked about the next phase! I’m writing this little ditty for your journal entry, I know how much of a stickler a military head doc can be, believe you me, brother man.