Sudden Storm

The weather changed suddenly this past Sunday.  In the afternoon, I contemplated having a party in the yard but decided we would bake in the sun because the yard faces south.  As we set up the chairs and tables in the dining room, a dark coolness grew outside.  By the time the first guests arrived, a light sprinkle had begun.  This rain carried on and became a full shower.   My last soggy guests' shoes brought wet leaves and pieces of stick that I forgot to sweep off the front path.  We left the door open in the living room in order to get more light, and we ate and drank and laughed in the dining room and kitchen.  Gradually, in small sets of twos and threes, my guests put on their shoes and left, some of them running to their cars as if they could avoid getting wet. 

After everyone was gone I washed the dishes and cleaned up.  The house was warm and still held a happy party spirit.  But the rain was even stronger and the wind twirled around the house outside as if angry that we didn't invite it to the party.  When I finally went to bed, I listened to the wild, angry storm outside and compared it to the steady quiet of my husband's breathing.  I didn't sleep well and got up to watch television for a while.  The wind was blowing at 45 miles per hour.

In the morning, I tried to defy the wind and the cold by wearing a simple shirt to work.  I ran from the house to the garage and from my car to my office building, and I kept the heater on most of the day.  My joints and muscles ached so I skipped dance class and dreaded the coming of winter.  When I returned home with my grandson later that evening, my garbage cans had blown down the alley.  He laughed delightedly as I skittered about outside in high heels turning up the garbage cans from the muddy lot next door and rolling them back to the house.  But inside the house was still warm and toasty and we ignored the cold as we built and destroyed domino towers together.  I didn't sleep well again. 

By Tuesday, the wind had died down but the cold remained.  I was defeated and put on a sweater and my trenchcoat.  I walked to the car instead of running and I only needed the heater for the last half of the day, but the storm had gotten inside of me and I had an angry confrontation with a co-worker.  In the evening, I sat through class with burning eyes.  My head hurt, my heart was unsteady, and I craved sleep.  I thought about the gladiolas in the garden.  I planted 50 of them in August, but they were shallow in the ground so I had to stake them all.  Two of them had snapped under the force of the water from the sprinkler and I had braced them with pencils and secured them with Band-Aids.  The wind had beaten them and now they were sprawled crazily in all different directions, yet in bloom and adding depth and dimension to the garden.  The dahlias heavy heads hung over, their faces looking at the grass.  I wondered how the Brussels Sprouts are doing.  Have they been covered with slugs because of the rain?  Or has it been too windy and cold for them to come above ground?  What about today now that the sun has decided to come out for a while?  Is it still too cold? 

I glanced at the yard as I grabbed the paper this morning and saw all my garden joy hiding behind cold weather work.  I thought about the 150 or so tulip bulbs I have to plant from last years flowers.  So much beauty is waiting to be seen.  This is how life is, isn't it?  So much beauty is waiting to be seen.  So many simple pleasures and islands of joy waiting to share themselves with us.  Just behind the work; just behind a little bit of time; right there.  Don't you see it?