We’ve had a week of stormy weather at the Farm, a crazy quilt of weather that’s swung from gentle rain to soaking rain to cloudiest to hail, and back around the horn again. And again.
Last evening, this craziness culminated in a thunderstorm. Not just any thunderstorm, but one of the especially violent spring thunderstorms that come only in late April or early May: the kind that gathers its forces slowly, menacingly over the hours, not the minutes; the kind that first utters scattered rumbling threats from afar as if clearing its throat in preparation for its final overhead scream of war; the kind that tests your level of discomfort with skitters of lightning scattered about in deliberate, probing reconnaissance; the kind that advances inevitably upon you all the while.
For all of its advance warnings, this storm paused in the moments prior to final onslaught to coat the atmosphere with a mixture of oil colors in shades of dread and remorse, thickly applying each coat by means of palette  knife, layer upon layer, until the sky was suffused with portent as if it were the pock-marked face of God, until the air was nearly dense and gritty enough to touch, until the air was nearly edible. I am almost certain that had I gone outside in the moment before final assault, I could have grabbed and eaten some, and remained, chewing as if a cow with its cud, to be cleansed anew by the long-promised downpour of God’s rage and tears.
As slowly as the storm built, it passed in but an instant.  The storm front moved on to other objectives, leaving behind a steady, soaking rain to wash the air clean of oil paints and to bury the remains of the now-fallen hailstones with which it began its assault.
And when everything was clean and buried, the sun reasserted its cheerful aspect as if to say that all was now forgiven.
Gavin, That was a masterpiece! Your words transported me to the farm while I listened and watched with you. More storms please!
Tom