There’s another storm hitting tonight. Seems like we’ve had a lot of storms lately. Storms with gusts that roar through the trees outside like a jet taking off down the street. Storms that hit so hard the whole house shudders in response.
It’s winter. The time of year for storms. And we live on a small island in Alaska. In a community threaded between jagged mountains and the sea. An area that often sits in the path of fierce storms that blow in off the Pacific.
Sometimes I can picture in my mind the storms building to the southeast of us. Something stirs them up out on the ocean. They start spinning , tripping up on themselves, whipping into a frenzy. The winds grow fierce. The waters become violent. The storm builds, turning in on itself, becoming more and more volatile. And then it hits land.
The water slaps and pounds at the rock. The wind tears its way through the trees. Ripping at roofs, and slamming into windows. At times it’s so harsh it’s difficult to walk. Even to stand.
When the fury of those storms is finally unleashed it can be so staggering that it feels like you can’t breathe. That standing out in the force of the storms, facing into the wind, you have to will yourself to breathe. Always feeling at first like you have no breath. That your lungs cannot function in the force of the wind. You squint against the gusts and remind yourself that you can still breathe.
We’ve had a lot of other storms lately, too. Deaths. Violence. Families ripped apart by drug and alcohol addiction. Illnesses. Shootings. War. Unemployment. Schedules that are too busy. Families that are too busy. Worries. Stresses. Fears. Frustrations. Sometimes the storms hit so hard that it’s difficult even to breathe. It’s a struggle just to stay standing.
One storm has barely blown through and another is already out there building. Crime, homelessness, intolerance, suicide. Winding up like a top, whipping itself into a fury, waiting to unleash its rage. Injustice. Turmoil. Strife. The waters pound at the beach, the wind rips and tears at the trees, and we stand there squinting into the worst of it willing ourselves to keep breathing. Wondering how many more storms there will be. And how long until the next one hits.
Not long ago we stood on a beach one night with friends. The skies were clear. The night was crisp, and still. There was a full moon. And the light from the moon started bouncing and flashing on the water like a hundred little sparklers on the Fourth of July. We just stood there on the beach, in awe. Taking everything in. Admiring the beauty all around us. The sparkling moonlight on the water. The snow-dusted mountains in the distance. The stillness of the night.
We watched as a low fog slowly slipped in along a channel, fully shrouding the island behind it. The air was still, and everything was so reverently quiet that even our occasional comments to each other were whispered so as to not disrupt the stillness. The sanctity.
I looked around at our friends who were there with us and thought of all the blessings we have been given. Our families. Our friends. Our community. Our faith.
There have been a lot of storms lately. But as I looked around on the beach the other night, I got to thinking that along with all the storms there have also been a lot of moments like this one.
Moments of sitting around the kitchen table laughing and visiting with friends. Moments of snuggling on the couch with our kids, watching a movie we’ve already seen 100 times before. And moments of just standing on a beach admiring the stillness of a cold, clear, moonlit winter night.
And I think maybe I’ve been spending too much time thinking about the storms lately, and not enough time thinking about those other moments. The moments of peaceful beauty that remind me why it is that we’ve chosen to live on a small island in Alaska, on the edge of the sea. Moments that make weathering the storms worthwhile. Moments of such stillness and wonder.
And it just might be that if it weren’t for the storms I wouldn’t fully appreciate the beauty of those other moments. The moments of grace.
penniesonmypath 