After The Storm

Yesterday, I went to my best friend's Mom's funeral. She was 88 so she lived a goodly number of years. I am also good friends with his brothers and went to college with all three of them. So, altogether fitting to be there in their time of sorrow.  Being from a Band of Brothers myself, I connect with he and his siblings. I consider them almost like a family. We still suffer from the loss of those close to us even though we know that she and all of us are destined to die.

As I was preparing to head to where the funeral was being held, a church about 30 minutes away, I checked the satellite weather map. It has been raining ferociously all week here in Central Pennsylvania. A lot of flooding. I wanted to dodge being on the road during one of the downpours. It appeared like if I hustled back to my home after the service, I would have time to wait out the storm from the safety of the house and then head back out later to hang out with some friends.

So, water has been a theme all week. I had a DVD from Netflix waiting about 7 days to be watched. It was Noah, the fairly recent release. The last thing I wanted to do was soak that in since we have already been under a deluge. Everything is moist. Paper at school is wilting and wet. We just need a solid baking for about three days. The hops have mold on them, the garden is turning into an aquarium.

The Noah film was interesting. It told parts of the biblical story but then created other story "arcs" to heighten the tension. As if the whole world being drowned except Noah's family and the animals lacked a dramatic punch.  I liked that the film did reveal the inner world of Noah where justice and mercy played out in a protracted battle. It reminded me of Soren K.'s Fear And Trembling where he explored the inner agony of Abraham after he is told by God to sacrifice his son Isaac.

These stories are dark and malevolent and mysterious, much like much of reality and life in a fallen world in exile from Eden. Any attempt to take out the darkness creates a lack of depth. Much like modern praise music. All up, no down. Mere gas. No substance. No wonder people practice all forms of escapism. We can't face and accept that storms are the lot of humanity. All told, we here in the U.S. have it pretty good despite our whining like spoiled brats.   

It is certainly interesting that water is both a blessing and a curse. All sunshine makes a desert, but all rain makes an ocean. Many scoff at the destructive power of H20 portrayed in the Bible but then the Tsunami in East Asia, Hurricane Katrina, and etc. has rattled our sense of superiority. Ancients both revered and feared water for good reason.

There is a balance of sorts between the two and Pennsylvania is probably one of those rare places that gets both in spades, which makes our state very agricultural and some of the best farmland in the world. Which we are promptly putting parking lots and big box stores on. Just turning Lancaster into a Philly Metro ex-burb. I left Philly but it followed me and I am chagrined about it. The plus side is that I can get a Wawa hoagie twenty minutes from my house.

Wawa was going to build on the corner down my road then probably studied the demographics a bit more and realized that this is not a moneyed area. They sold the parcel of land to Sheetz which fits more the lowbrow character of my town.  I was sad to see Wawa not be close but it does make the trip to get a hoagie more anticipatory and exciting. And perhaps heighten my ultimate enjoyment.

The traffic is near gridlock on the major routes closer to Lancaster. Only the relative poverty of where I live is keeping the corporate chains off the board in this part of the County. How poor is it? The K-Mart store is still in business because it serves that clientele and Wal- Mart was unable to get a foothold about four miles East.  And we have those telltale Rent-To-Own establishments which suckers the less wealthy into manifestly bad contracts to put big screen televisions and the like in their places of residence.

Get the big cable package and there goes your discretionary income to lift your boat out of the swamp of making just enough to make the minimum payments.

After the storm blew over for the most part, or maybe it was more of an interlude where the rain resumed later, I chilled with some friends down in Lancaster City on one of the dude's porch. We often sit there, drinking a beer or two, and chat about things both silly and serious. And, we often swing back and forth between the mundane and the meaningful.

I made a point towards the end of the end of the night that I think mental health is premised on the understanding that life must be accepted on its own terms. Astonishingly beautiful at times, occasionally bitter and tragic, and often seeming just about getting through the day with my head above water and not drowning. Drying off and then jumping back into rough seas the next day. To do it all again.

One storm ends, the sun shines for a spell, then another storm. For after the storm is ultimately just before another one.