the storm

Once in a while I dream about my dad and he's always well and happy. When I wake up I feel cheerful. He had the same effect on me when he was alive. He'd tell me a joke or an interesting animal fact he'd read or he'd try to poke me in the ribs because he knew I was ticklish. I depended on my dad to help me with my algebra homework in high school and he was the one who waited up for me when I went on a date on Saturday night. He was a peaceful man and he liked to sit outside after dark and just be quiet. Sometimes I'd sit with him and we'd listen to the night.

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The Storm

I was eight years old and it was a Saturday at the turn of autumn in Michigan. It had been a drippy gloomy day but the weather turned worse in the early afternoon with strong winds, sharp lightening and lots of thunder. Passing my dad in the hallway of our small tract home, I made myself tell him I was afraid. We weren't supposed to give into our fears. Mama said it was silly and I didn't want to be a baby.

Dad stopped, thought for a moment, and ran his hand through his receding black hair. He looked at his own closed bedroom door. He knew then and I found out years later that my mother was lying across their bed with her arms over her head and her face buried into the bedspread, trying not to give into her own stormy fears.

"Come with me, Suzanne. I want to show you something."

He led me to the tiny bedroom I shared with my two younger sisters. He sat down on the edge of the roll-away bed I shared with six year old Karla and I sat on four year old Kathy's twin bed. He raised the wooden sashed window over the book laden table. I leaned on the table with my elbows toward the open screen and felt the cool breeze and rainy mist whoosh across my small, round face.

"Feels good, doesn't it,? he asked.

"Yeah."

Lightning flashed, thunder boomed, and I jumped. He looked at me through his thick black framed glasses.

"Did you see the lightning bolt? Did you notice how crooked it was when it flashed and then how it trailed across the sky?"

"It was real white, too," I said. I was very helpful.

"What about the thunder? Did you hear how full the rumble sounded? It was like it wrapped around the whole world. It sounded like drums," he said.

He pointed toward a large Maple tree in the center of our postage stamp sized front yard.

"Watch as the strong older tree stays straight and lets its branches whip around in the wind. Now, see the flexible young maple by the street bow down as the wind passes through here?"

I didn't say much as we watched. His voice was low but enthusiastic about the scene in front of us as he fed me child-sized bites of the storm.

The rain started coming down harder in great sheets across the small porch and sidewalk in front of the house.

"Suzanne, see the patterns of the rain over there on the street?"

I watched traveling sheets of water move from our yard to the street where they collided with other sheets of rain., Then they bunched up and disappeared down the drains under the curb of the street. When the next lightning flash lit up the sky and the next roll of thunder crashed, my eyes flew to Dad's face. His contented gaze didn't change as the storm raged. Taking my cues from him, I didn't jump at the next flashes and rolls. I now asked, "Daddy, did you hear that?" and said, "Oh, Daddy. Look at that one!"

I don't know how long we sat there as he pointed out the ragged, earthy beauty of the day's storm and I don't know where my little sisters were. I can't say how long my mother hid out on their bed, but I do remember my utter lack of fear when he closed the window.