The Cloud Behind the Wall

The cloud on an engineering diagram is neither white nor soft. It is a boundary, enclosing the network that this drawing does not draw for the moment. Many years later, a low-frequency sound began behind the wall: cooling and heat exhaust running through the night; the earplugs were replaced with another pair, yet sleep still grew lighter.

The omission on the drawing is not dishonest. If every line were spread out in full, the drawing would no longer be a drawing; the person reading it knows there is something inside that cluster of lines, and also knows it can be unfolded later if necessary. The honesty of that cloud does not lie in drawing everything, but in not pretending that the blank space is emptiness.

What later changed were the words “for the moment.” Not drawing it for the moment was slowly heard as no need to know.

Inside the server room, hearing protection is required; outside the wall, even earplugs are not enough. That sound is not like an explosion, nor like a one-time construction job. An explosion at least has a moment of rupture; construction at least offers some ending one can look forward to. Low-frequency sound is harder to deal with. It has no clear event boundary, only staying low, continuing on, leaving no moment at which one can say, “up to here.”

Many noise ordinances are accustomed to waiting for an ending: the party will disperse, the construction will stop, the vehicles will drive away. On the other side of the wall there is no party, only a server room that will not disperse.