Rain

Yesterday was more than rainy. For a while, I suspected that I would need a boat to get home from work. I could hear rain slamming the roof, threatening to burst in on us, and it was hard to concentrate.

I love a light, gentle drizzle, the lulling tap of rain drops on windows. What we got yesterday was the opposite: forceful rain, roaring thunder, angry wind. I have never liked thunderstorms. They are the sound of destruction to me, and I just can’t wait for them to be over.

I texted my husband to see if he was safe at home yet, and once he was, I felt a bit better. He said I should just come on home, but since we were under a tornado warning, we weren’t even allowed to leave the office.

I stayed a little late at work, waiting for a brief easing of the downpour, then made a bolt for my car. Why did I park so dang far away when I knew it was going to rain? I wrestled my umbrella against the wind, then finally slammed the car door against the mess and headed home at last.

Pulling into the driveway always makes me feel instantly more at peace, and running from the car to the front porch, I was relieved. My husband smiled as I came inside, and I closed and locked the door against the storm outside.

This morning, it was blissfully chilly, everything still drenched, but calm, raindrops perched on edges of flower petals and leaves. Soon, hot and muggy weather will march in and make itself at home, so I soaked in as much of the cool morning as I could.

Now that the rain has passed, my mind has turned to our garden and what to dive into this weekend. Mulch was delivered today, and I would much rather be at home, cleaning up flower beds and getting covered in mud and mulch crumbs, transforming our yard one small bit at a time, slowly erasing the scars of winter and dressing up each flower bed in fresh spring finery.

Well, I might be stuck at my desk instead, but nothing is stopping me from scribbling down my yard work to-do list or looking up gardening inspiration online, is it?

What Does It Feel Like?

I wonder…what does it feel like to watch my husband and me, so happy and in love with each other, while she remains terminally alone, every relationship she feebly attempts disastrously imploding because she is incapable of caring about anyone but herself?

What does it feel like, each day, to pull into the rutted dirt driveway of a barren, collapsing trailer, at risk of being mistaken for abandoned, while we own our cozy house and are proud to come home to it –and to each other — every day?

What does it feel like to sit for hours, alone, hungrily scrolling through my blog, using the kids’ accounts to pore over our Facebook pages, rooting like a starved, snorting pig for any shred of information about us?

While she focused on bitterness, we focused on moving on. While she focused on herself, we focused on the kids and on each other. While she focused on endlessly and jealously attacking us, we focused on protecting and caring for each other.

I don’t have to wonder: how it feels to be completely, unwaveringly loved. How it feels to set eyes on him and feel like I’m at home, no matter where we are. How it feels to be intensely proud of what we have overcome and achieved together. How it feels to act silly just to hear him laugh, because that is one of the happiest and most magnificent sounds I can imagine. How it feels to be both beautifully at peace and endlessly excited by the same irreplaceable person.

She will never feel any of that. She has chosen to live in such a way that severed any possibility of feeling anything beyond shallow, meaningless playacting and desperate attention-seeking from any hapless victim willing to indulge her out of pity or boredom.

In the end, then…it seems that all of us have received exactly what we deserved all along, doesn’t it?

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