After the Storm

It was nearly 9 o’clock when I rolled out of bed for the day. First thing I did was go out to see what the storm had done. Blessings upon blessings, from a benevolently indifferent Universe, there was no damage, as far as I could determine. All that noise, from both the storm and from me, was for naught, except that the bird bath is now full of free water. We all like free water, the birds because there is no chlorine in it, and I because it won’t be on my next water bill.

The thermometer at the back door read 78F. With all the moisture deposited by the storm, I know this is going to be an uncomfortably humid day. Good thing I have so much work to do inside and, thereby, can avoid going out in it until later this evening.

I sat at the back door, enjoying a cup of coffee, letting my mind wander (which it loves to do). A huge robin (American robin, which is actually a thrush) hopped up to the bird bath, cocking his head side to side, as if in disbelief at his luck: a full bath, which looked unused! In he hopped, and spent the next five or so minutes splashing to his heart’s content – and to mine, as well.

Brain, she of the sarcastic comments, went back to thinking. I let her do it while I drank my coffee.

“You know,” she began. “That storm from last night is the perfect metaphor for your life.”

How so?

“Storms are sometimes frightening, often do damage to people and property, to the land under their feet; sometimes the very foundations of their lives are washed away. Those who survive are faced with the often heartbreaking, perhaps horrendously monumental, task of starting over from next to nothing.”

I think I see where you’re going with this analogy, I answered.

“Metaphor. This is a metaphorical comparison.”

Whatever!

“Some survivors never fully recover, but most do. You can be among the majority, if you choose to be.”

I choose to be.

I started this blog in the midst of a divorce, the first of a four year series of storms. It wasn’t the divorce that was the storm, but the circumstances that led me to file for it. There have been subsequent mental illness storms; three of them serious, the most recent of which I am pulling out of ‘even as we speak.’ Every month is a financial storm, though the damages have been minor, thus far, and manageable. There have been times I thought I could not possibly make it back from the edge, but here I am.

Sometimes I look around me at the debris field left behind by the storms and become discouraged at what lies before me. I can’t see into the future, but I’m trying not to worry about it. I am trying to live in the moment, to be mindful and grateful for what remains undamaged, to approach the work of clean-up and recovery one small piece at a time. When the enormity of the task threatens to overwhelm me, I try to look at my list of things to do to remind myself of what I have accomplished already.

I have no clear idea of where I am going right now, but like the flower bud just emerging, it will open before me in the fullness of time.