The Still Hawk

Once in a while we get to see something remarkable. It may come as a lesson or a consolation. I had been tossing internally with an emotional storm raging. This is what I saw that afternoon:

It was the third day of a vicious storm. Trees furiously flung their branches about; roaring, raging. The storm clawed at all that stood, whipping rain into confrontation, pelting the roof of my car. My car shook and trembled with the gusts.
I was smoking a cigarette, parked on Myrtle street, by a friend's house. Through the windshield I looked passively to the edge, where the last houses hunkered; next to the open, winter bare fields. The wipers were grunting the rain off the windshield, barely keeping up. Through the rain streaked window, I saw a large bird, perhaps a Hawk, hanging nearly motionless in the sky. Subtle wing adjustments kept it in a precise place, slipping through the gusts, unaffected by the wind and rain. The hawk was using the energy of the wind, accepting what he needed, elusive toward what might force him out of place. He stayed there, as if glued to an invisible post, fifty feet off the ground.

Seeing that, I thought about this lesson from nature. To me it felt as if I was given this experience to illustrate an attitude that I needed to just get through the storm inside of me. Unfortunately, I still am not able to weather those internal storms. After all these years, I still get tossed like salad when in turmoil. When will I learn? However, it was a comfort, back when I had noone to talk to about my troubles. For that I am grateful.