Unalarming

I was awakened this morning at 4:30 by a distant sound that at first did not register in my mind. I had to strain to hear its constant rhythmic tone but it was definitely there. Then I realized what it was, a car or house alarm set off in the darkness, trying to do its job to alert someone, anyone. I arose and peeked out the bedroom window but all seemed quiet out front. So I dressed quickly and went down the hallway to investigate further. The sound became louder as I neared the living room, but not loud enough to be in my own driveway. I knew my cars were safe. I glanced out the living room windows but saw nothing unusual. The sound was too distant to be coming from my neighbor's house behind me but I couldn't pinpoint the source. Perhaps it was the convenience store down on the next block. I wondered if anyone else had heard it and reported it, rather doubtful since there were no other lights on in the neighborhood except mine. Before I had a chance to pick up the phone and call the police, the alarm suddenly stopped, leaving me to wonder what had set it off. We have had a rash of burglaries in our little town lately. Could there be someone lurking around? Or was the alarm triggered, most likely, by accident? I knew I wouldn't be able to go back to bed so here I sit, my husband sleeping undisturbed down the hall.

A fable from years ago came to mind about the boy who cried wolf. With so many homes and cars and anything else of value wired with alarms we have become immune to their warnings. These alarms are mostly ignored because they are set off so often in error that we have conditioned ourselves to block their assorted sounds from our consciousness. My family has been known to sleep soundly through the ear-piercing screech of our smoke alarms screaming just outside their bedroom doors. Our town summons the volunteer firemen with the weather sirens so I am sure many of the townspeople sleep right through the tornado warning siren as a result of its overuse. We are barraged with the wailing of police cars, fire trucks and ambulances, so much so that it sometimes takes a few moments to remember that we are to move out of their way. Nobody pays any attention when a store's shoplifter alarm goes off, we just assume the clerk forgot to remove or deactivate the security tag. Even in our airports we are nonchalant about the beeping at the security gates, expecting nothing more than a loose coin or some other inane object to be the cause, as is usually the case. At my office the fire alarms have been triggered so many times in the past year that we can evacuate the three-story building in seconds. We move quickly only because of the deafening shrill tone, but we have become very casual in assuming it is only a false alarm set off by some unseen, unknown cause. We leave the building to save our ears, not our lives. Alarms have become rather unalarming. I wonder what type of sound would be useful in startling people into sudden alertness should a true disaster befall us. Perhaps a blaring tune from the Lawrence Welk show?