When I was a kid, I used to live near a Train Garage for our city subway system. I always had insomnia so I was always awake late at night when the trains were parking and making that hiss sound of break, when they had to stop or slow down.
I didn't knew at the time what was that sound so I was terrifying and imagined a monster. (I was obviously very scared to actually look outside to see if there was anything there.)
It was not a sudden break for the trains, so it made a slow hissing noise that for me at the time sounded like a distorted flute. I remember reading in one of my father's books about centaurs playing flutes (I think I've seen an drawing of it) and I associated with that sound.
I think it took years for me to actually witness the trains parking outside of my window, to fully realize that it was not a monstrous Centaur roaming the street at night playing a flute. But this image that my childish mind created was very creepy and interesting so it stuck with me. When you stop to think about it, this vision would be absolutely horrifying.
Nowadays I cherish this memory as one of my childish interactions with mythology and a window to how the human brain personifies the unknown into fantastical beings. That's the kind of thing that I really like to study as an adult scholar-wannabe.
