In search of a strategy to help me relax during post-op recuperation, I’m currently listening to the calming sounds of rainfall on YouTube. This ten hour video, shot in a park on one static camera, bequeathing to it’s viewer/listener the relaxing tones of cascading precipitation.

I’d like to clarify, I don’t intend listening to all ten hours of the video, slickly titled ‘Quiet Night in the Park with Relaxing Sounds of Rain Falling Down the Empty Alleys, Puddles & Leaves’……… Well, not unless I have a really stressful day anyhow!

Playing in a background browser of my laptop, this inaugural attempt at introducing tranquillity via sounds of inclemency is proving effective. It maybe not everyone’s ‘go to’ topic for easing angst, however I’m finding thus far the precipitation’s refrain is contributing towards the inner serenity which I crave.

I’m unsure what it is about rainfall’s tones that calms the mood. Maybe it evolved through the ages as a comforting audio with it’s arrival signalling replenishment of drinking water stocks, along with it’s sustenance of food sources.

In the same way we potentially grew to love the smell of burning wood or coal as we equated that sensory event with warmth and comfort. I’m no naturalist, or indeed undertaken any research to back either theory, however I like to think on some level they may hold some basis in fact.

Despite the appeasing modulation rainfall, prolonged exposure to it does have it’s downsides. For instance, I’ve now been listening to this video for twenty minutes with a consequence that I’m absolutely bursting for a pee.

Listening to sustained precipitation isn’t the only avenue I’m pursuing to maintain a level of calmness appropriate for mitigating against a second cardiac arrest. Amongst a vast list of things that ‘wind me up’ here’s a few examples of what I’ll be endeavouring to avoid:-

Negative people;… reality TV shows;… We Buy Any Car’ commercials with Phillip Schofield;… my wife’s thoughts on my lack of input into the marriage;… her dad’s thoughts on anything whatsoever;… Andre Rieu shows on Sky Arts;… people whining about non-problems;… Brexit news;… US political news;… TV presenter Richard Madeley’s insincerity;… my mum playing down her intellectual capacity;… talk of me tightrope crossing the Grand Canyon on a unicycle;… worthless opinions of the unenlightened;… my phone alarm ringtone option of heavy gunfire;… and anything beginning with the letter z (apart from maybe zebras).

It’ll be a hard task avoiding the many potential triggers to a more stressed demeanour, especially now I’m unable to visit the zoo or watch the movie Zulu.

There’s a Catalan proverb that proffers “From the bitterness of disease man learns the sweetness of health.” A lesson that blindsided me a week today when learning the pains I’d suffered overnight had been caused by a heart attack.

I’ve been very lucky to be given a second chance. This time last week as I laid in my bed in Leeds General Infirmary god looked down and in his broad Yorkshire accent told me “Tha’s ‘ad an escape, Gary lad!….. Don’t mess eet up again th’a knows!”

Hopefully I can repay that faith.