Thunderstorms
They're my favorite weather phenomenon. It's been raining regularly here for the past month, but it wasn't until last night that the thunder and lightning rolled out. It seems strange that something with such violence and volatility could give me peace, but storms do.
I remember taking lawnchairs out the driveway, to the edge of our property and the gravel road that passed it, with my dad. When I was in high school, we'd sit and watch the lightning splintering in the distance, the product of electrical storms. In reminiscing, it occurs to me that we probably only did that once or twice, but I've been thinking of it as our thing, what we always did. During a period when I barely spoke to my parents without screaming, and shied away from any emotionality whatsoever, now I'm surprised to remember that time with full emotion. It's an incredibly special memory for me.
I remember, too, being 15 or 16, driving home from Hannah's house during a storm. It was evening, so technically darkness had fallen, but the lightning was so close, so fierce, so present that I needed no headlights to steer my way home. I actually shielded my eyes from all the light, and I wavered between wanting to pull over and wait out the storm, or keep driving to get to safety sooner. Mildly terrifying, yes, but as a youthful veteran of tempestuous Kansas weather, I knew I was safe in the car, so the night held less fear and more power.
It would stand to reason that I'd end up with another storm lover. The most special storms happened in Door County, in the middle of the night, in Tim's room that was three walls of windows. Now when we get woken up by storms, we snuggle in together, battened down by sleep-heavy kitties, enjoying every thunder clap.
I remember taking lawnchairs out the driveway, to the edge of our property and the gravel road that passed it, with my dad. When I was in high school, we'd sit and watch the lightning splintering in the distance, the product of electrical storms. In reminiscing, it occurs to me that we probably only did that once or twice, but I've been thinking of it as our thing, what we always did. During a period when I barely spoke to my parents without screaming, and shied away from any emotionality whatsoever, now I'm surprised to remember that time with full emotion. It's an incredibly special memory for me.
I remember, too, being 15 or 16, driving home from Hannah's house during a storm. It was evening, so technically darkness had fallen, but the lightning was so close, so fierce, so present that I needed no headlights to steer my way home. I actually shielded my eyes from all the light, and I wavered between wanting to pull over and wait out the storm, or keep driving to get to safety sooner. Mildly terrifying, yes, but as a youthful veteran of tempestuous Kansas weather, I knew I was safe in the car, so the night held less fear and more power.
It would stand to reason that I'd end up with another storm lover. The most special storms happened in Door County, in the middle of the night, in Tim's room that was three walls of windows. Now when we get woken up by storms, we snuggle in together, battened down by sleep-heavy kitties, enjoying every thunder clap.
posted by LE at 1:57 PM
3 Comments:
maybe its being a kansan, or a barta-moran, but i feel the same way about thunderstoms. there's something so exciting and at the same time comforting about them. just hearing you talk about KS and storms makes me happy and also, sad. we rarely get a good thunderstorm in chicago.
Where? We grew up outside a small town about an hour north of Wichita.
I loooooove thunderstorms the most ever.
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