The Storm

The fire hisses and crackles behind me as I stand, staring out into the dark. The fire’s warmth barely touches my back, although it is mere feet away. In front of me, the storm rages over the valley. Rain runs in rivulets down my naked form. My beard lays matted to my face and neck. The wind shakes the trees, blowing in from the northeast like a gale.

I tilt my face up to the dark sky, arms outstretched, letting the driving rain strike me full in the face. In the distance, between wind gusts, I could hear the water raging over the waterfall several hundred feet below me.

There is something primal, something magical, to be in a driving rainstorm, even if it is the end of November, when snow should be covering the ground by the foot already. The energy involved in condensing water vapor into droplets which then fall victim to gravity, propelled by the wind into a stinging pellet of liquid water, is impossible to ignore when you are connected to the earth.

Thoughts of the water cycle enter my head. How this storm would inevitably lead to the evaporation of water molecules that had fallen, increasing the water vapor in the sky until once again the cycle repeated itself. All without a single human intervention. Nature’s cycle, working perfectly.

That thought leads to how the water cycle is one natural cycle out of many that go on without our control or intervention. Breathing, heartbeat, the solar cycle, the lunar cycle. The earth’s rotation and axis tilt. So many more.

It truly brings home how microscopic our existences are in this world. How much we do not matter to the overall scheme of things, and how much we rely on things we cannot control; things that will eventually destroy life here on this planet when they stop working.

But enough of such dark thoughts. It’s time to enjoy the rain. Burn the fire high, brothers and sisters, I’ll be playing in the rain all night. You can see me dancing joyfully from tree to tree, like an odd Sasquatch-looking dryad. I invite you to join me.