Some days you get the storm and the light.
This will not be one of them; it will be a brilliantly sunny day, no weather in sight, and if we are less than lucky, more of the same trickster wind that has bedeviled us these last two days without surcease.
We are entering that phase of spring when the winds should be dying down now, keeping their powder dry, as it were, for use in aiding the rain. “Should” is meaningless in these days of colonialism-driven climate change and attendant deepening drought. Today will likely be spent beneath a sun impervious to all entreaties to warm the air, ceding air temperature to the bitter chill of the wind once more.
No stormclouds and no rainbows, but at least we have the green.
It’s taken long enough, certainly; the last of the trees are only now leafing, including the willows and several of the aspens. The globe willow in the image above, such a new, young, fragile thing when Wings captured that photo on a summer’s day some thirteen or fourteen years ago, has now grown into something robust and round as the globe that gives it its name. It, too, is relatively newly green now, but where some of the trees seem spindly and wanting, this one is strong.
As a herald attendant upon a rainbow, that seems a good thing.
No, no rainbow today, and very likely not for the whole of the week, if this morning’s long-range forecast is to be believed, but that spot in the south field has long been a magnet for the light spectrum’s end. There will be at least a few such colorful curves in the evening sky this year, and every one of them will be welcome, whether accompanied by precipitation or not.
The fact of the matter, though, is that we are rarely granted the rainbow without at least a little of the rain . . . and never without the light. The old pine ladder in the photo is gone now, torn apart by a true trickster wind a year or two later: more than a dust devil, a spiraling vortex of ferocious power that ripped through the land and destroyed our tipi, too. Seeing it here, climbing not merely the arbor but the very sky itself, reminds us that emergence is a repeat process, one of many small breakthroughs out of defined darknesses into limited light.
Limited light that nonetheless seems magical at the time, all the moreso because it is cast against the backdrop of the storm. We know that darkness is looming, and yet it is a different darkness from the one we just escaped, and hope is a reckless thing, always certain that it can survive all comers.
Occasionally, hope is right, perhaps less by virtue of our own efforts than because the spirits smile upon us. There’s a word for that in my people’s language that shares an etymological root with the word for changeability, even indecisiveness. It’s a word that translates roughly, in English, to grace, and it became the name of this photo: a chance to remain rooted, and yet to ascend; a chance to touch the same skies where the spirits dwell, to share the light they know, if only for that moment of emergence.
It’s a lesson that hits home now, in both climatic terms and deeply personal ones. And grace is a gift we shall need, this week, and far beyond.
And it’s a reminder that emergence is as much an act of the spirit as the body. It’s good to remain firmly rooted in the earth of our ancestors. It’s also good to allow ourselves moments to ascend, to seek wisdom found in the same ancient light they knew so well.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2021; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
