It has begun.
It stormed the other night. One of the first of the season.
Jagged forks of lightning illuminated the clouds, twisting serpentine through the sky, before relinquishing hundreds of millions of joules and trillions of watts into the ground. For a brief moment, heaven and earth were bridged by a single tenuous thread of raw energy.
I didn’t like it. I almost never do. While my friends claim the peals of thunder rumbling their bones and the incessant drumming of rain on a rooftop lulls them to sleep, I find myself agitated and nervous, jumping at each blinding flash of heavenly fury, tensing my shoulders and back awaiting the inevitable whip-crack retort of air heated to 54,000 degrees Fahrenheit in a millionth of a second. Contrary to popular belief, however, I don’t fear thunderstorms; I have a grudging respect for them. How could I not? Is it possible for a person to watch a 60,000 foot-high anvil-shaped storm front rolling unchecked across the prairie, its crown wreathed in the golden light of the setting sun while purple darkness lies sandwiched between it and earth and not feel drawn to it? To see lightning silently crackling over its skin and not feel the power behind the billowing, pillow-like surface? To feel its coming, the hot, heavy and humid air pressing down on you and not feel powerless? To watch it grow, looming larger and larger before its presence fills the sky and you have to retreat to shelter before hail, rain and wind wear you down—for as sure as a storm can re-carve a landscape to suit it, surely it must be able to re-carve a human to its own image?
It’s no wonder thunderstorms feature so prominently in myth and lore.
Now, some would say that I live in the wrong place. That’s only partly true. My love of the Midwest summer rarely extends to the weather. I’ve only experienced three states of it: windy, great gusts blow unimpeded across hundreds of miles of flat prairie, picking up grit and dirt to whip against unprotected skin; hot, heavy and oppressive heat that drains the energy from your limbs, until sweat coats your frame, staining your shirt; and the rarely occurring perfect summer day, when sunbeams lay gently on your skin while a gentle breeze carries the smell of summer—fresh cut grass, flower gardens and dark, rich soil—while whisking away any lingering discomfort of a long, bleak and cold winter.
While I am leery of storms, I accept their inevitability. They are the heralds of longer days filled with beer and grilling. Beer and camping trips. Beer and kickball leagues. Beer and the Outdoors—a place that until now has been unwelcoming and harsh, a place that we have passed through briefly, dreading the act stepping out of the confines of a warm house or car. I look forward to days of staring wistfully out windows, wishing that I was out there doing something, anything. I look forward to summer weddings, this year even being able to include my own.
In fact, I look forward to being outside so much that I think I will now.
