things move around

I’m out at a huge old sprawling heavy-industrial plant this week. I’m working on the second floor of an old two-story house which was subsumed by the plant long ago. In the attic above me some birds are nesting; I hear the chip-cheep of the chicks periodically through the mouldering plaster of the ceiling. At three o’clock every day a hooter, slightly muted, signals home-time for the office workers, though not for me. At three fifteen, any lunatics still hard at it are treated to a piped clock chime - ding dong ding dong, ding dong ding dong, etc. - as a further reminder of their proper hours. This chime rang out 11 minutes ago, and now it’s just me and the hatchlings left, chirruping at eachother intermittently. It is tranquil, and I’m paid well, but if in the past I’d ever had an ambition for today, I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t have been this.