Every good thing that comes is accompanied by trouble
I am running away from this statement. This is where my heart turns hard and my chest fills up with a hot weight. Fear of the unknown is the one thing that all those politicians, those men on the hill, have in common. They count on this fear that the wrong choice or , more accurately, guess will be our undoing. Our nation under God. I thought we were under Canada. Really. Let me be clear. I need to be sitting at the table with bittersweet and candles.
The candles have been used. The burnt wicks tell the story of a meal shared and a host thoughtfully providing the soft light of tapers to encourage a relaxed state. Candles to wash over her guests with calm while they are comforted by delicious aromas, polished wood floors to caress their feet. The wood stove warm with the fire laid there earlier.
I have spent a much of my lifetime in anticipation of what will come next. Not the happy surprise generally, but more often the rebuke or disappointment. This is not to say that these things will happen. The future often holds the bowl of bittersweet offered up with trust in grace.
There are the creatures living each moment outside four walls in the fields and woods, without the realization or thought that trouble is coming. Only with the whiff of smoke or a change of wind will they go to ground, in direct response to immanent threat. No, they don’t think, “This apple orchard is so great. I love eating this stuff.” Nor do they wonder, “That delicious apple must mean there will be catastrophe around the corner.” That kind of thinking belongs to us, sentient beings; the bipeds with awareness, emotions and the notion of other.
There was a period of time, just after I had decided to change my favorite pastime, that everything in the future seemed frightening. The sound of an ambulance would provoke a rush of hot tears; footfall on the stairs would make my bowels loosen. Even the good things were portents of apocalypse.
As a kid, full of beans and happy to see everything as new and exciting, I loved thunder storms. My sister, 7 years older and so cool with her bedtime personal care regime and her transistor radio would shut off the light when the radio signal began to crackle, summer air shifted and a glow from the north signaled a coming storm. She would come over to my bed and grab my pink down comforter, whispering,"Come on. Let's watch the storm.” She would open the window wide, settle us both wrapped in a nest of pink satin and we would watch, counting the space between each flash to clap of thunder after it. We would extend our hands out the window, inviting the rain to splash upon our open palms. There was no fear there. This was something good and the awesome cracks of thunder approaching us in our little room were an announcement that rain was arriving and cool air with it.
Times change. I changed. I looked for signs and felt fear. Clouds piling up from the east, pushing fast across the hills made my heart thud. A black swan coming down the river symbolized death. I’ was sure of it. Were the children safe? Is the illness coming back? Would we have enough? Would we lose it? Time to stay in the moment now. The hush accompanying the calm of the storm is a blessing. A gift for the woman who wants less. The sound of a single chime.
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