As I sit here in Colorado on my daughter’s front porch writing out these thoughts, my husband and friends in Oklahoma are hunkered down beneath a lead apron of a summer storm. In fact, also last night I was out for an evening run and got caught in a rainstorm, but it was gentle and delicious. Not really much of a storm. Still, that synchronicity again.

On our long drive from Oklahoma to Colorado a few days ago, Jocelyn and I enjoyed mostly spectacular weather. We got so lucky, in fact, that both of us commented throughout our journey how nice it was. The triple-digit heat was on pause, mercifully. Easy cloud cover shaded her SUV. Barely any wind to knock us around. We were having fun and making great time.

And then the weather changed.

Somewhere just past the Kansas-Colorado border, the previously tranquil clouds swelled into dark, massive, churning things that stood not a little threatening over our path. Sunshine streamed through and against them in metallic opposition, but the translucent white had turned gray and murky then nearly black. Rain fell in unbelievably huge drops, pelting us, and then we heard hail. Not much, in fact not enough to do any damage, but it was a noisy interruption to our day of spectacular travel weather. Had we been easily shaken travelers, the noise would have been scary.

On that straight stretch of highway with vast grazing and farmland on both sides, we drove steadily. Stopping was both unnecessary and foolish. Also- we could gaze not far ahead and plainly see abundant sunshine again and dry asphalt roads. The storm raging overhead was angry but small and unmoving. Temporary. We only had to get through it.

It got worse before it got better, of course. By the time we reached the far edge of the storm shadow, tiny hail was falling plentifully and we had seen several mercury threads of lightning.

Then, in a moment, we were out. Back in the sun. Not a drop of rain still falling. The highway shoulders were overflowing with gallons and gallons of those tiny white hailstones, and this stretched on for about a quarter of a mile. It made me do a double take, to make sure, but yes- the storm was over. This carpet of hail was proof it had swept through, but all we had to do was keep the windshield wipers going a moment longer to clear our vision a little and continue forward.

This little scene unfolded during one of my driving shifts. Joc was sitting next to me with her sweet, energetic puppy on her lap. I looked at them and felt so much love and simultaneously noticed an absence of fear. I felt as calm as the skies now looked. I checked the rear view mirror and saw that black-and-blue storm still raging behind us, appearing to do much more damage than it had the power to do.

That little storm did happen; it was not imagined. But it’s behind us now and we came out of it perfectly safe and happy with a million things to celebrate and an exciting path in front of us.

Lots of storms do very real damage, of course. Nobody from Oklahoma (or Colorado!) would dare say otherwise. But plenty are brief and gentle, too. Sometimes instead of stopping in your tracks just to get beat up for no reason, it’s best to move steadily forward on your chosen path. Let the storm rage if it must but keep your eyes on the abundant sunshine coming right up. Move toward that until your storm is far behind you.

“Birds sing after a storm;
why shouldn’t people feel as free to delight
in whatever sunlight remains to them?”
~Rose Kennedy
XOXOXOXO

Estes Park, Colorado, July 2016

Arrival:

This is the third time I have visited her in her mountain home, and each time as my vehicle enters the shadows and begins threading up and around the curving roads I experience a familiar chain of sensations. The move from valley to mountains is all at once physical, emotional, spiritual, and something completely new, like an echo of a recurring dream I had throughout most of my childhood and sometimes even still. (The dream was about God, stillness, a giant wooden mallet, a hair or maybe it was a thread, and violent spinning until stillness was reached again. It was about chaos and safety and love, I now know.)

In a crescendo, the slate-and-soil, tree-crusted hills bow down to vaulted craggy skyscrapers jutting up into the vacant sky barely fifteen feet from the two-lane road. Boulders of all sizes, spilled some other day probably long ago but not necessarily, sit in heaps, punctuating the clear, rushing, white water river. The river curves down and alongside, behind, and in gentle loops near our ascending path, achieving a ribbon dance between that cold energetic snow melt rife with fish and this man made pavement dotted with people like me. We are all seeking either solitude or reunion; but everyone gets a heavy dusting of mountain magic.

I feel embraced. Every time. The earth and rock on both sides of the road pulse with loving energy. They beg to be touched, explored, admired. The trees offer whispering perfume and welcoming, intimate secrets. The sky- different every time, this time as red as coals!- hovers a little pridefully, crowning all this beauty with still more beauty. Only one structure really interrupts the mountainous skyline: The Stanley Hotel. And it belongs here. It is perfect.

I feel deeply energized, quite against my will or at least with no effort made to feel this way: Something ignites behind the lowest part of my rib cage and then my legs feel bouncy. I start remembering lost loved ones like my Grandma Dunaway who loved to hunt lichen, mushrooms, and wildflowers. She did her magic in rural Oklahoma, but I believe she would have loved Colorado too. I start remembering (with excitement! not defeat) my own forgotten dreams and goals. It’s a wonderful and much needed re-connection with myself.

The physical sense of vibration or humming is very real too. The mountains pulse, and it drums up something vibrant inside me. I cannot wait to escape the car to sort of thrust myself onto the face of the Earth. The hum is a clear invitation and a powerful antidote to frayed nerves. Comforting. All the sights and sounds and smells immediately begin filling my empty places.

Morning:

Sitting on the bare wooden steps at the front of her tiny (perfect!) cabin, I face north. We are nearly to the top of a steep hill, and the mountains on the opposite side of town face me. They glow from the side with this brilliant, stinging daybreak. Shadows cast off to the west. The “Twin Owls” rock formation presides lovingly.

Behind me is the top of her hill, a wild little space where the paved road ends. When I visited in April we had enjoyed a surprise late-winter storm. So that precipice was deeply blanketed in soft, glittering, blue-white snow. The trees were tall Narnia imposters. I was spellbound. We bundled up and hiked in the cold and ate donuts then hiked some more.

Today I sit here gulping strong coffee, wearing thin cotton pajamas, sweating just a little, and that same hill is every shade of arid and now thickly blanketed with seedy, prairie-like grass. The trees remember their Narnia showcase but now are a vibrant green. Fluffy pine bouquets whispering that familiar perfume.

She is evolving and vibrating in her own right, and she is as strong and beautiful as the mountians and as alive as the snowmelt river. My first baby, a woman now and a force of nature.

I breathe it all in deeply, pressing into my cells every vibration I can locate. Remembering, renewing, dreaming, and giving thanks until the words run dry.

“The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks.”
~Tennessee Williams
XOXOXOXO