07.12.01/2
The silence between the storms
For the last two days I've been listening to "Nothing At All" by O-Town. As cheesy as it is, it's telling me what to do.
Though knowing what to do isn't that hard because my feelings have started to (rapidly) fade. I guess it's bothering me because. . . please don't judge me for what I say. . . because all my life my mother has been telling me that I'm beautiful, deep, soulful, desirable, lovable, everything that every woman would want to hear. And Amanda and Eva and Ann, in their own ways tell me. . . people who love me say that I deserve this, more than this, will become this. Deep down I believe that good things come, that beauty will find me, that love poems will flow from me again. But Time is telling me other things. Mostly I try not to, but lately I've been depending on someone, some boy specifically, to come along and make me whole. Which isn't true because I am whole without any boy to sex me up and love me down.
I sat and watched the thunder storm last night. Watched it rage, ravish the leaves on the trees, wash the dirt from the pavement, and threaten all of our civilized houses. This is an edited version of what I wrote:
Please hold on to me.
There is so much electricity in this thunderstorm tonight. You can feel it in your bloodstream. You can feel the power calling you from beyond the places that you know today. Beyond the places that exist in this world anymore. Back to the instinct of fear that the anger of the gods leave you feeling. What the thunder and the lightening and snow and all raw elements could mean.
Who are the gods raging against tonight? What man is stuck on the ocean covered only by the wood of his boat?
God's revenge comes in this storm. The gods of the skies are raging against our world.
Go on. Rip out the trees. Steal our securities.
Kill our homes.
We deserve this.
Let this emotion out.
Let it escape.
Rage against what I hate.
Rage against this misunderstanding of me.
Watch the sky light up because you don't get angrier than God is right now.
Not the sorrow that was in the fall. This is raw. Unavoidable. Undeniable. Mother Nature at her peak. You can't hide from this right now.
Only the weak would be scared of this tonight. Just let go and embrace this force.
The animals hide because they know what this can do. We sit and watch, are entranced by the idea of playing with fire. Playing with something so much bigger, so much more that us -- than what we will ever understand.
Will this wash away our pain, our guilt, our sin? Will this rain clense us from deep inside our souls?
Give up on the notion of what you're supposed to do. Who cares about what is right or wrong. Don't think about what other people are doing -- how they could compare you to them. What they're going to say tomorrow what you say, "last night I sat in awe of nature as she raged before me. I felt like the storm was put on for me to show a little insight into something larger than what I will ever be. Something that I can only hope to become part of once I'm gone. Something that told me last night she will not lie down and let us kill her. She threatened us, tried to show how we could all be wiped out in one wave of her hand. That we cannot control what she becomes when we don't expect her to be anything anymore."
This is it: silence between us.
-Sue Miller
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