storms

i wrote this long blog post in my head last night.  i was having some anxiety.  there were some big storms rolling in.  and usually i like big storms.  but after our last little hail storm, which was our first little hail storm in this house with all the windows, i started feeling a little vulnerable, i guess.  so i was anxious.  and here's what i was thinking about...

life has lots of metaphorical storms that roll through.  and like last night's storm, i know things will be fine, i know they will pass, i know some good will come from them and there will be some things to repair and fix and some things will probably just be lost.  but those are things.  and ultimately, life will go on and storms will keep happening and we will keep being changed by them and that's just how life is.

i thought about lots of "storms"....but for some reason, i don't have it in me to recall them in detail right now.  but illness, death, careers, family, children, sexuality, religion, school, pride, education....these were the uniting themes as i remember.  some were loooong.  some were mercifully short.  all of them change the landscape of the lives of those endured them.

so back to last night's anxiety.  we are in a new house...a new place.  i don't yet know where we're vulnerable, what to watch out for, where our defenses will be breached.  (yeah, my guys have been watching lord of the rings lately...)  and it makes me...well...super anxious.  after all the "storms" of the last few years, i find my enthusiasm for actual storms a little challenged.  but i did find peace in tying the two together.  in relaxing my muscles as i listened to the first wave of thunderstorms hit.  (i swear it rained in my front yard for almost five minutes before it actually rained on my house.  it is crazy the way storms work.)  there were at least two other waves that i heard.  and i was ok.  i prayed a lot.  because for me, that's really the solution to it all.  the faith or belief or whatever you wanna call it that what's damaged will either be fixable or something you can learn to live without, and the sun will come back out, and life will continue onward.  and there will be more storms.  and more sun. 

i posted this on my facebook yesterday...

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart
and try to love the questions themselves ...
Don't search for the answers,
which could not be given to you now,
because you would not be able to live them.
And the point is, to live everything.
Live the questions now.
Perhaps then, someday far in the future,
you will gradually, without even noticing it,
live your way into the answer.
- Rainer Maria Rilke

my friend jeanni was the first person to start teaching me this.  and even though it's been over two years since she died, i find myself understanding it more and more as time goes by.  last night, it was a beacon.  (one i planted myself earlier in the day.  that kind of stuff used to amaze me, but now i'm just grateful for the grace to be moved and respond.) 

peace