Watching the Sky

What is it that makes me run outside to see a big storm coming? Why do I crave to see it? I search for the darkest clouds and see the trees all around, flowing like river grasses, submitted to the wind. It's not the risk of it, because I'm not looking at that. Maybe it's the rarity of it. It's not too often, relatively speaking, that we get to see trees sway like that or see dark, heavy clouds clipping by on a low ceiling. Today I was thinking tornado.

It's all quiet now; it was just a few long bursts of wind, unusual though, no lightning and only a few spatters of rain. But the wind! The sound of it in the trees with a great deep gust; the rise and fall- how do you describe it? Up to a swell, a wave, and then settling to quiet. Who knows which storm will be my last? Who knows? Why would I want to miss a spectacle so easily seen from the front row?

Maybe it's the sheer power of it, the energy of it that pulls me in. Maybe it's the way my senses are all swept up in it. I stood out in the driveway a little while ago, looking up and turning around in all directions, breathing deeply. I thought I could smell some far away place blowing in on the wind. I closed my eyes. Then it occurred to me that I must look like a total nut case to my neighbor across the street. I came back in.

Maybe the enormity of what has happened in my life is like the spectacle of a storm; Sometimes I can stand outside myself with a curiosity and watch the way grief happens. It's strange how the brain rewires around loss. I have bizarre lapses of recent memory and also return of long-lost memories. I have days of fatigue and days of renewed energy. Days of pessimism and days of vision. There is constant heartache and then laughter too, at times. I feel like I am taking more of the everyday memory pangs in stride. There are longer stretches of time when losing David is not foremost in my mind. I am working through it.

There's a re-centering coming over me on a much deeper level than I had hoped for.
I ask for prayer in this: that I practice a consciousness of my motivations, and also that I will be gentle and patient with myself.

xxoo