The Storm

I sit in my high-backed computer chair, observing the billowing storm from the nearby window; water droplets had sprayed themselves in spidery shapes across the window before I had even notice it had begin to rain; for I could not hear it, a large pair of headphones perched upon my head, belching loud music into my ears.

The tree adjacent to the window sill was waving around haphazardly in the strong wind, its leaves slipping and sliding along the window, dripping heavy droplets of rain into the small garden beneath it.

A man and his dog walk along the foot path casually, seemingly oblivious to the raging tempest around them. After watching the duo for some time until they disappeared around the corner, I turned my attention up towards the sky. Although it was only half past three in the afternoon, the sky was already dark. It was a uniform gloomy grey, with patches of lighter greys here and there. Looking further across the sky, I see a faded blue and white mix in the distance which meant the storm would soon be over, surely to be replaced by a stiflingly warm, humid atmosphere like it had been the rest of the day, and the day before that ... like it had been almost all month.

We were into mid-September and in the thick of Spring, and the weather had been avidly changing its mind all month; first it gave us sizzling hot days that made us remove our woolly jackets that stuck to our sweaty backs. Then it decided to throw gallons of water at us with torrential rain. Mind you, the rain was cold, but the air was still sticky and hot, so we were caught in a kind of hot/cold limbo.

By now the rain had begun to settle, but occasional gusts of wind still swept over the trees on the sides of the street. Patches of bright blue had begun to appear in the sky, and the rain had ceased. I sit and watch the wet road for a time, when suddenly thin sheets of rain start pouring down again as abruptly as the previous had left.

I lie back serenely and watch the rain for a while; my bare feet up comfortably on the chair. Watching through my rain streaked window like some weird kaleidoscope, I hum to myself absent-mindedly.

The rain seemed to be fighting a losing battle it seemed, already the clouds had begun to dissipate and the rain slowed to a weak drizzle. Soon, the rain stopped altogether.

I lay my exposed feet back down onto soft carpet and gaze up at the sky, watching the clouds move away slowly. A beam of sunlight shoots down from the heavens and streams through my window, quick as lightning evaporating the drops of water hanging to the glass windowpane, bringing with it the promise of a warm eve.

Already the grass had started to glisten; the leaves of the tree seemed to flourish with a new light and the black asphalt looked cleaned and revitalised.

And so it ended.

It came as quick as a hummingbird flaps its tiny little wings, it left as quickly as a hare from an eagle.

That ever existent, unconquerable force of nature.

You can hide from it, but you cannot remove it from the world.

It moves about on tumbling waves of thunder and lightning at a pace to rival a falcon.

Nature’s leviathan,

God’s wrath,

Man’s virtue:

The Storm.