The hurricane that I love

Many years ago I worked as a weatherman for a small group of radio stations on the East Coast. Well, not specifically as a weatherman, but a decent portion of my job was to turn on my microphone and hear a DJ say something like, "now it's time to check on the weather, Matt are you there?" I would babble on about sun or rain, snow or slush, sometimes, depending on the DJ and the stations format, we would talk a but about something else, then he/she would announce a song or commercial and I was gone.

That said, I like hurricanes. I like the force of a hurricane, the power and beauty, the way it will touch down and do its damage and then disappear. Hurricanes leave a mess behind as it willfully moves on to its next target, a target that is never easy to discern.

There is something beautiful about a hurricane. The way it does not seem to care about anything else, if you are in its path, it will hurt you. If you are not in its path, but you house is, it will hurt it. There is a simple logic to hurricanes, stay calm, stay clear and stay awake.

Sometimes our internal life is a bit like a hurricane. On the exterior, we are calm and controlled, but inside, in our brains, everything is a mess, falling a part, being thrown against the walls of our skull. I also like people that have an inner dialog that does not always match their external appearance. I once had a date in Seattle that, externally speaking, was beautiful and reserved, but interior wise, a complete and utter mess. I snuck away while drinks were ordered, never bothering to look back.

My sense is that many people, especially in this economy, are feeling as though there is a storm brewing, either on the employment front, of inside of themselves, where the threat of a long dry spell could cause long term damage.

If there is one thing I learned during my tenure as a weatherman is it this, predictions are hardly ever accurate, preparing for the worst keeps you ready for almost anything, and even when we are prepared, when we have taken all the proper precautions, when the hurricane actually hits, we will never be the same.