This Pillow Book entry is inspired by The Pillow Book of Sei Shōnagon, translated and edited by Ivan Morris. Sei Shōnagon was a courtesan in 10th century Japan who kept a diary of the goings-on at court and concealed it in her wooden pillow. She made lists under various categories of specific, often quirky things.
136. Things that fall from the sky
Rain, but not often in this dry Oklahoma air.
A soft mist that envelops warmed skin, kissing cheeks, eyelids.
A moist whisper across waiting lips.
A foreign taste in the air.
Breathe it in and a quiver runs up the spine, fluttering the heart.
An indescribable feeling surges through the blood, firing in the brain, igniting the soul.
Boiling up through the chest, turning to steam as you exhale a long-held breath.
Opening your mouth, reaching out with your tongue for one last drop.
Face upturned, your eyes drift closed, lips tremble, and you finally feel the relief.
Tornadoes. Like they did 20 years ago today in Little Rock, Arkansas. Dropping from a pregnant spring sky and tearing through our communities. Destroying. Mangling. Changing everything. Forever. Crises can mimic the physical storms in our lives: a spinning storm descending into our orderly thoughts and lives. Teeming emotions can beat against our battened hatches, destructive and seemingly unending. Why? Is our world design-less? Arbitrary? Are these physical, emotional, and spiritual crises random? Indiscriminate? Without plan or function?
To answer these questions I created a concept map: A way to order some of my thoughts on a few specific incidents and how they relate to answering this question of Why?
Our physical, emotional, and spiritual struggles may appear to be a spinning storm, but they are not causeless in their destructiveness. Personal and physical storms are not arbitrary and neither are their resulting consequences. Weathering storms creates strength in both nature and in our personal growth, spiritual and emotional.
Why do we ask why? Is there a higher power, a great designer, a creator that has imbued us with a sense of general curiosity and the need for scientific and self-discovery? If there is do you know Him? Can He bring you through your storms, strengthened and with intent for your physical, emotional, and spiritual growth?
Notes:
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| My eldest son playing among the Golden Bells that my mother and I planted the morning before the Tornadoes tore through our neighborhood. This was 3 years after the fledgling bushes weathered the storm. |
