I have always deeply appreciated thunderstorms. The kind that rattles your bones. The kind you smelled coming the hour before it cracked the sky. A poignant wind cools the air, and the soul shivers in anticipation.
These experiences do so much for me in so many ways that it is honestly quite difficult to relay in any concise manner. When my bones rattle from the thunder and my eyes become dazzled by the flickering lights in the sky, I remember how visceral a thing it is to be alive. That this world rages like we do, causes problems for others in ways it doesn't necessarily intend. Just like we do.
It similarly inspires.
The best thunderstorms are the rapturous ones, the ones that demand your attention so vividly that all the distractions in the day-to-day cease. Everyone stops what they're doing just to meet the eyes of the nearest person with an expression of "did you just hear that?"
And of course they did. But that wasn't really the question, was it?
"I mean, did you hear that?" we say again in knowing.
My parents always cracked a smile when they asked me that, and I smiled in kind. I was so grateful to share that moment with them, to be alive with them. We were all in awe of something that reminded us just how human we are. It is so easy to forget with the comforts of modern life.
Now I ache to feel it again, with new people, in new places and holding new memories with which the thunder brings to light. I want to smile with someone in knowing. To sit under the clouds as time itself rolls over us, its wroth on full display.
And just as it came, it goes, like its own kind of dawn. By the end there is a tranquility that basks the land, its remnants in the form of puddles, dripping leaves, and hushed forests.
Everywhere I go I will always be on a journey to experience the thunder of that land. In tall city buildings, vast and sweeping meadows, or on a porch in the middle of nowhere, it brings a joy I still cannot contain.
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