Knife sharpener man

Ever since I moved to Sao Paulo last June there has been this mysterious noise. I hear it at least once a day outside my window, during the morning or afternoon. It sounds almost like a bird, and that is what I had been telling myself it was until today. The noise is like a high pitched squawk that moves slowly and methodically up and down the same scale until it hits its highest note which it sustains for a few seconds longer than all that precede.

Today while walking the dog I saw the knife sharpener man walking towards me, wheeling his cart in front of him. His existence is something that I picked up on a few months ago through the car window. I saw a man standing on the street with a tall wooden box in front of him, pumping a foot pedal attached to the bottom of the box, like that of an old sewing machine. The movement of the pedal was powering a large grey circle that was spinning at the top of the box. As I peered closer I realized that the man was holding a large kitchen knife against the whirling grey, sharpening it for the maid in her floral apron who stood, waiting patiently, outside the gate to her apartment building. As Kuma and I were about to pass him today, the knife sharpener man pulled a little something out of his breast pocket and brought it to his lips. The noise! All along it has been him and his pied pipe, alerting the masses to bring their knives outside. I smiled, soaking in my discovery, and the knife sharpener man put away his noise maker and whistled at Kuma who went over and gave him a sniff or two.

I wonder if the man who smiled at me today over his shoulder as we parted ways is in fact the same man I saw from my car, or if there are a whole trove of roving knife sharpeners. Is there a union? I may never know, but what I know for sure is that this time tomorrow I plan to have my knives packed and ready so that when I hear the no-longer-mysterious noise, I can be the first one outside the gate.