Eye of Your Storm

Tired of crying, the clouds returned to moody sniffles, hiding puffy eyes in the grey cumulus nimbus overhead. Like a child tip toeing down the hall at night, I anxiously took to the street, glancing skyward to see when the mood might turn for the worse and drench me. Stretching my legs out in a vigorous step, my lungs clawed at the thick air, taking in as much of the angsty winds as they could. And my heart beat heavy with gratitude. Breathing deep, breathing fresh air blown in from a coming storm ignites the body. After a while of walking untouched by rains, my confidence climbed and I walked face open and smiling into the grey day.

A newfound friend joined me and we wandered off to the newly renovated Port. Wide eyed with wonder we sized up the boats lounging in the sloppy waves of the harbor. Circling back around we headed for the Contemporary Art Museum to wrinkle our brows at the new exhibit they'd put out on neon lights and Warhol. If Alice in Wonderland were to have a play room, then that's what this art exhibit would have looked like. Mind boggling ecleticism.

I found that when you're struggling with your own rhythm, it helps to simplify your goal and say, I will keep pace with this one friend. I will be present for them and with them. And so enough you find yourself pleasurably staring into fountains of golden tires in a room covered with pictures of caves thinking, I've descended into the cavern of something great. But really it's a superficial thing...it's the surface that matters. The effect of the art on the eye, on the mind, on the heart. It's seeing it and letting yourself see it.

And its seeing that you can breathe as you stare into your own blurry reflection in glass covered paintings on the wall as your chest rising and falling all....it helps when you can't stop looking inward for answers to come up for a breath and look around...and let people draw your attention to other things beside yourself.

You'll be there when you get back. Let the mind out of its cage and let it play amidst the possiblities on the walls, on the pedastals, on the floor, in the air, and when it comes back, it will find that the heart beats a bit stronger, having found its muscle and having been given the space to expand, and a strange contentment edges closer.

I always knew walks led to good things. I never thought they could take you to the eye of your own storm though.