As I write, the sky is the strange yellow color that experience has taught me means tornadoes will happen somewhere. Indeed, the winds have already snapped the last pitiful tree in my backyard. They will cut it down now too, like all the others.
But I get ahead of myself.
I’ve been somewhat ill since returning home from Maui. Initially I thought it was just sinus pain brought on from all of the various changes in elevation, but then the condition worsened. Nothing horrible — hacking cough, fever, chills — that sort of flu-like thing. I suspect it’s just another case of what I call airport ebola; caused by breathing all sorts of touristy germs when confined in the small space of an airplane. Or perhaps it is the flu, since that’s going around here too. No matter. I’ve been home, in bed, half-dead, and bored shitless.
After watching a zillion episodes of Texhnolyze, I decided I needed to get out of the house before I completely turned to stone and wallowed endlessly in post-apocalyptic visions.
I also knew it was going to storm early this morning.
So I loaded my system up with painkillers, antihistamines, flu meds, and whatever else I could lay my hands on, hopped into a roasting shower, dressed, and went out at around 12:30ish on Friday night [well technically Saturday morning, but I'm not uptight about linear time like that].
The bar was rather full even at that hour, and it was the usual thing; people chattering on endlessly, drinking, and playing the usual social games. It’s so hollow to me these days that I can barely recall anything about that portion of the evening — not because of excessive drinking, but simply because it washes over me like white noise. I’m sure I participated in conversations, smiled, nodded, laughed, cracked jokes, and all the rest — but I wasn’t there. I am rarely there anymore. My mind was on the storm. I was waiting.
Storms are really the only genuine way to experience nature in a city — the rest of the time, it’s just concrete. Miles and miles of concrete and swarming hordes of humanity. Everything is angular, constructed, unnatural, even the so called ‘green spaces’ have a certain disagreeable falseness to them. However, a good storm can transcend the oppressiveness of such an environment; it whips and whines through a city — wild, ferocious, and above all, natural.
One can always feel the shift in the city when a storm is coming. Porcupine arrays of weather and radio towers, satellite dishes, and emergency sirens all guarantee that a city gets plenty of warning. To me, they show how afraid city-dwellers are of nature. Not a particularly profound observation, I know, but still, the collective tensing of a city buzzes loudly in my subconscious. I seek it out — glad to see arrogant humanity cowed even just a little. Perhaps I’m just petty that way.
Of course, there’s also the pleasure of the storm itself.
The bar closed, and we were all being tossed out for the night, when an offer was made to drink beer at a boat house. Aha!, I thought, water, wind and waves? Yes, yes, yes! Although still ill, and rather worn out, I consented to go out to the lake. Rain started to fall on the drive out, and I began to worry that I had inadvertently missed the best part — when a storm first rolls in. Not so. This storm didn’t really get rolling until around 4 in the morning.
We’d built a fire [another elemental joy!] and had shitty cans of beer and junk food whilst listening to the wind hammer the building. Rain dashed itself to angry pieces on the roof, and the waves of the lake writhed against the shore. We spoke of many things, but I recall the storm the most. And the sunrise. And the grackles congregating in the tree by the shore, hunting around with eager mouths — undoubtedly for freshly drowned worms. And the herd of geese that we chased into the water, honking their displeasure at our childishness as they sailed out of reach. It was a good night and morning.
I miss nature so much here in the city. The verdant coolness of my pine forest in the early Louisiana morning. The fiery maples and wild apples of Nova Scotia in autumn. The green smell of the Niagara in the summer. The crisp magical air of Taos when fly fishing in a canyon, sipping hot black coffee from a thermos. The rainbows of fish, flowers, and clouds in Maui. The graceful lunar austerity of Iceland with its steaming ground and crystalline water. The water lilies unfurling delicate lemon-scented petals on Black Lake in the spring. *sighs*
I could go on for ages.
Trying to work here is like having a wedding in a coffin.
