The Passing Storm

"There's a sound of distant thunder and I'm glad it's not a war I'm fighting. I have too many of my own battles to contend with." -Me

I'm wide awake. It's 1:30am and I hear thunder from distant storms. I read earlier that severe weather had damaged at least 10 homes here in eastern Tennessee tonight. At that time, there had not been any reports of deaths or injuries, to which I was relieved to hear. But the news continues to be covered even when I'm not reading about it on the Internet, hearing it on the radio, or watching it on TV. It might be a different story in the morning.

Right here, right now, the night insects are still calling out for mates and the rolling of thunder still sounds distant. There isn't any wind nor is there rain falling on the roof. Every now and then, the AC unit kicks on, drowning out all sounds of the outside world for just a few minutes; and when it cycles down, the night sounds resume. But the incessant sound of inner thoughts can't be muffled by the insects nor thunder nor the window unit in my room.

There's a place not too far from here, perhaps only an hour away, that popped into my mind tonight. I haven't been there in many years, but I can hear the water trickling over the rocks and her laughter echoing through them still. A hot summer day, two people with no one else in sight, and a sense of bravery over inhibitions created an unforgettable experience with nature and natural beauty. There was no rain, no thunder then; no battles being fought. Just love...

There is wind now. I can hear it blowing through the trees in my yard and through the trusses of the faux roof above this place. I believe rain is not far off.

It's long gone now, but another place on the side of a mountain, where behind the confines of a locked door, a whirlpool tub overflowed with round shimmering pockets of rainbow color. Perhaps we shouldn't have put bubble bath liquid in a whirlpool tub, but it wasn't a forethought, rather one made in hindsight as we laughed about the sticky situation. Once again, just love...

There's the rain. I hear it hitting the windows as it gets blown by the increasing wind and I hear it hitting the ground as it runs off the roof. That thunder is a lot closer now, too.

The waves of the Atlantic Ocean came crashing in with crests of glowing white and the stars eerily reflected off its rolling surface and the crashing sound was too loud and the sand was too thick and my brain couldn't comprehend and I couldn't take it anymore. My feet started moving and my voice quit working  and the motel room got further away the closer we got to it. Blackness was creeping and my thoughts were thinking that what I thought was in those capsules was not what was in those capsules at all. No, not at all. But she started the tub and the water poured over my hair and her hand petted my head and soothing words came out of her mouth and the fear and the loathing flowed down; it circled round and found the drain. There was no rain, but there was thunder from a battle being fought that night, not between the two, but within the one; within myself.

There's still thunder. There's still rain. Intermittent thunder; constant rain. And I'm still awake.

All that stuff from the past? It's gone as a real thing. But just as this passing storm, it's reality. The storms will pass. They might leave behind evidence of their passing. They might just pass on through without a trace, with only the memory of the thunder and the watering of a thirsty landscape left as a reminder. That's the good stuff a storm leaves behind. It does the things that it's supposed to do; water the earth, clean the air, cool the temperatures. It does what it is intended to do, then it moves on. But you know it's been there.

Why I thought about this stuff tonight is beyond me. It's been years since major storms have passed in my life, but evidence of their passing still linger as an etching of professed love lingers in the bark of an ever-growing tree. The bark may cover over most of the scar, but if the etched memory was made deep enough, it will always be there.

I think about other places around the world, places I've never been to and probably never will visit, that the sound of thunder might not indicate a weather related storm, but instead a storm of war; flashes of lightning that are fired missles; the sound of thunder that are exploding bombs; raindrops are a hail of bullets. I think of these things and I think, "I'm glad that's not my storm."

I think I'm in a pretty good place now. I'm not concerned with much. I have my kids, my job, my decreasing waistline, and my increasing health and happiness. I'm a patient man. I don't mind waiting through storms for what's right. As I was folding clothes earlier tonight, I saw a t-shirt of my daughter's. On it, there was a T-Rex, an asteroid, and the words, "Good things come to those who wait...sometimes." As insightful and thoughtful as it is, I laughed. She has my humor.

It's 3:30am now. The storm has passed. The rain has tapered off and the thunder is distant once again. My wandering mind? It too had tapered off to a distant thunder. It is almost quiet.

And it waits.

From Wishes to Weeds

Long, spindly stalks topped with spheres of fuzzy white
With breath from pursed lips, wanted wishes take flight.
Spiraling, spinning, scattering seeds,
Float and then land, turning wishes to weeds.
-Me

"Be careful what you wish for. You just might get it all. And then some you don't want." -Chris Daughtry

"A dream is a wish your heart makes." -Cinderella

Where have all the dandelions gone? Those yellow flowers turned wish-granters have all but disappeared from my yard. Not that it's a bad thing, with them being hard-to-kill weeds and all, but I wonder where they went? My yard is far from manicured. I mow it. I don't water it and I certainly don't fertilize it. It's lucky if I even take the time to rake the leaves off of it in Autumn. Dandelions used to spot my yard with their towering stalks gone to seed, but now there's only handfuls scattered here and there amongst the other weeds.

This weed is superstitiously charming. Children are most susceptible to its charms. What childlike mind wouldn't be? I know I was. Nobody was there to tell me that to blow on them was to plant them; I was told to make a wish and that wishes made wouldn't come true if I didn't get every parachute off with the power from one breath. I made sure to blow as hard as I could every time, because even then, I knew that wishes ungranted are wishes wasted. With my own kids, I didn't restrain them from blowing on dandelion stalks, even though I knew that it was spreading that innocuous weed all over. They believed in the magic of wish-making and a little part of me did too. I wanted to believe.

Wishes don't come true just because you want them to. I know that. There's nothing magical, truly, about wishes made, nor wishes granted. They're just dreams put into words to generate hope. There's no power in a dandelion seed. There's no genie in a bottle; no leprechaun's pot of gold. We make wishes over flamed candles on birthday cakes. We throw away money on wishes in wells, ponds, and fountains. We pull apart a dried bone from the main course from Thanksgiving dinner in hopes of dreams come true. We wish upon a small dot in the night sky, a dot that has most likely burned out long ago. Wasted; all of these wishes are for naught.

I've wished for many things that I never got. I wished to not get hurt. I wished to never hurt anyone. I wished for things to go the way I wanted. I wished for peace and understanding in unknown situations. I've wished for things that last like they're supposed to. I suppose the most likely wishes that come true are the ones that you make come true; ones where you take action upon getting what you want. You want that job? Apply for it. Like that person? Ask 'em out. Things don't normally just fall into your lap. Just like my current improvement in my health and my weight loss; I did wish I could lose weight, but it wasn't going to just happen all by itself. I had to take action, and I'm sure glad I did.

I still wish. I don't make wishes, I just wish. I wish for good in the lives of myself and others. I wish positively. I wish with love and compassion. But above all else, and perhaps the most damaging, I wish retrospectively. The past dredges up all sort of wishes; one for each bad decision; one for each mistake made; and a never ending supply for never ending failures. Most of my wishes pertain to holding on to things that I should let go of; things that are over and done with; things that would rather hurt than heal. I should not want those things. It seems that I am drawn to the broken. I wish I wasn't.

I spent this past weekend at a beautiful place with beautiful people. It's a place that holds beautiful memories; memories that I will cherish forever. It's a place where, even if I was there all alone, I'd feel surrounded by the ones I've spent time with there before. In another life, my kids were innocent babies enjoying this place. One of my favorite pictures is of my son, naked to the world, sitting on a high-backed chair, his little cheeks visible through the space between seat and back with the river as a background. It was there that my daughter met her fishing buddy, a friend of mine who took the time to show a 4-year old girl secrets to catching "the big one." I've been there with companions of the opposite sex, making memories that I will never forget, each being special in their own time and place in my life. The time spent there is time away from this humdrum life; and each time the moment comes to leave, I wish I could just stay. But eventually, even that beautiful place grows weeds.

This weekend won't match last weekend, and being what it is, it shouldn't anyway. It will be special in its own right. Saturday, there's a good chance that I will be making a wish over a frosted confection. I'll try to not to spread germs as I summon the power of the mighty candle wish.

I'm not supposed to reveal a wish, but I can reveal my hopes in the form of a wish. I wish for my family, and especially my children, to know how much I love them. I wish for my friends to know the same thing. I wish for happiness for those whom I loved/love who are no longer a part of my life. I wish for wisdom in making life's decisions. And while I'm at it, I might as well wish for $1,000,000. You never know. The busy wish granters might oblige me for a change.

It's never ending, this wanting; this hoping; this wishing. I don't know if it's a selfish thing, by wanting something for yourself, or generous, by wanting for others. But I do know one thing: There's too many wishes to make, and if my yard is any indication, not enough dandelions.