It takes a real storm

in the average person's life

to make him realize

how much worrying

he has done

over the squalls.
~ B. Barton

 

When a front is on it's way, we can smell it. It starts with a ding, ding, ding noise as the loose lanyards ring in bellish tones against the aluminum masts of the sailboats. It is a  frenzy of forewarning. Then, everything goes gray. There are no colors.

   

     It hits like a wall. The first instinct is panic, but I tell you now's the time to enjoy the wind devils as they whirl their circles on the water. It may be the only time in your life when you can actually see the wind. It can't hide itself as it hits the water in swirling chaos that suddenly decides to move off in another direction only to be replaced by a moody small tornado that will bear down on the same spot until it looks like something from a different world. The all-gray unpredictable world of fury has arrived.

  The loose lawn chairs now have their only chance to fly. The rules have changed. Umbrellas that have fought the wind for years suddenly submit and fly, fly, fly. The water itself decides to go with the wind to the east side of the lake and the channels rush and surge with the flow.  The Sun bursts through. We look for,,,, no,, we demand a rainbow as a sweet treat and reward to our voyeurism and then,,,, son of a gun, there it is! I hope you can be at my house someday when the wind decides to have a party. The thing is that it never calls ahead to let us know when, where, and how big?

After every storm the sun will smile;

for every problem there is a solution,

and the soul's indefeasible duty

is to be of good cheer.
~William R. Alger