Listening to London

Today I saw so many faces but less joy and more of the busy of business. I expect there to be noise in the city. But you know the amplitude doesn't impress me. The variety of noise catches me. The beep, beep, beep, beep...of the pedestrian traffic light. A girl bumps me with her rucksack. I hear the sound of my English and the sound of her Dutch. I barely notice the underlying scuff of shoes against a concrete sidewalk. It is the undertone of the city as the sound of katydids in a field in July. I would notice it more if it stopped. I didn't have to worry about that in McDonalds at 12:30. I looked around in Mc Donalds and didn't see smiles. I didn't see contentment. I didn't see leisure. People sat and ate. Maybe they were thinking there was more tasks -ones that came after lunch and before home. I couldn't tell. I was a part of this time somewhere between lunch and dinner and someone offered me a seat next to my son. He was grabbing lunch a literal quick bite and took time to shift down a seat as someone left and offered it to me. No eye contact, no reply to my thanks as he continued biting his Mc Chicken. His action is what I heard loudest today. Bet he never guessed.