split personality

Sitting on a hill in a park in Dolores Park an ambulance goes by, wailing it's rising and falling Song of Urgency. But in the dense urban city, the flat hard buildings form the audio equivalent of fun-house mirrors, echoing the siren.

Coming toward me is the single-minded and onrushing regular version. As it passes, rushing away, the doppler shift changes the tone from higher pitch to lower pitch, but the reflection off the buildings in the distance is only the echo of the original urgency.

The result - a two-tone discordant song of a split personality. Urgency ahead, lament behind.