A Container for a Number of Coins
Untitled | Rylee Brunett | Collage
A Container for a Number of Coins by Sofia Guyer
He’s reaching for the light switch when it occurs to him that he could go about his work in the dark. He is well acquainted with the room he stands in – after all, he’s inhabited it for twelve years. Everything in the room is familiar to him: the desk, the safe, and the singular window in the corner. Put generously, it’s a modest room.
Sitting at his desk, he withdraws his Tascam field recorder from the pocket of his winter coat and prepares himself for the day’s work. He presses the ‘record’ button and goes through the usual motions, unlocking the safe with the key hanging from his belt loop. He hums to himself while withdrawing a number of coins from the safe. It’s a tune that he can’t quite remember but remains ingrained in his memory all the same.
He slips easily into the process of wrapping the coins. It’s a repetitive task, one that a machine could complete but that he prefers to do himself. The room is silent but for the monotonous sound of coins clinking as they make contact one after the other.
The singular window permits a scarce amount of light into the room but withholds the cacophony of noise from the town outside. The sounds of traffic and dull chatter that occupy his morning walk to work can’t reach him in this room. And that is how he prefers it.
He continues sleeving coins for another four hours before he pauses the recording. He stands, stretching and appreciating the dull crack of his back that results.
Every day at noon he exits the room and rejoins the rest of the world, walking down to a small deli on the corner. He and the man at the deli counter have built a wordless understanding. He hands the man a five dollar bill and waits for his sandwich to be made -- he receives the same one every day, lettuce and turkey on sourdough. He always tips the man a dollar before returning to the bank room.
A few years back he would share his meal with the homeless man who sat outside the deli, another wordless understanding. One day he approached the deli and discovered the man was gone. It gave him 30 more minutes to sleeve quarters every day, as he no longer had anyone to keep company. He was okay with that. He was suited to solitude after so many years of it.
He spends his time after lunch wrapping quarters until the already dim light from the window disappears completely. He walks home, capturing the sounds of the city nightlife on his Tascam.
His nighttime routine is just as repetitive as the beginning of his day; he eats dinner and methodically goes through the day’s recordings. Once he compiles a result he’s happy with, he burns the found audio assemblage onto sides of empty tapes. Over the years he has amassed a total of 2191 tapes that he calls “a Container of a Number of Coins.”
The longest contribution to the collection clocks in at about six minutes. On a day when he had been feeling particularly reflective he had begun talking to himself and was quite pleased with the recording that resulted.
“You see, it is a simple life that I live but I still manage to find meaning in it. Many view my lifestyle as monotone and drab, but I enjoy it. My ambient works fulfil me and give meaning to my life. It’s easy to indulge in nihilism and resign yourself to a life of misery. One must find what brings joy to their life and create their own meaning. What do you think I’ve been trying to communicate in my ambient works for the past 12 years? Everything is an output of someone’s search for meaning. The books and records on your shelves, the dishes that you eat from, the clothing with which you dress yourself. People seek meaning in other people -- and sometimes they find it. And perhaps my recordings are similar to one another -- they are all comprised of the same elements; the metallic sounds that coins make when they’re dropped, the quiet stride of my shoes, the occasional hummed reprise of a song I can’t quite remember. Despite this, my recordings still embody everything I live for and I don’t feel like I’ve wasted my life creating them. Life is beautiful and we do have the time.”
His philosophical ramble went unrecognized and unshared with anyone else, but he didn’t mind. It was for himself anyways.
In one of his limited verbal interactions with others a woman asked him if he was unhappy with how his life played out. “No,” he told her. “I’m content.”
