Let It Rain

Yesterday our governor announced that we would all be staying put until June 10th. That’s ten weeks from now.

Ryan and I walked around the house today a little dumbfounded. We kept running into one another, looking a little bewildered, collectively realizing that this is going to be our reality for the next three months. It was as if we were getting used to the scenery — even though the setting and the company haven’t changed in years.

We are incredibly lucky. We have jobs. We have a home. We have groceries -- and even toilet paper. Still, there’s sadness. For the canceled plans and for the little tented cabin we had rented the first week of June in our very favorite place. Much heavier sadness for a friend who closed the doors to his restaurant today, for a health care provider whose caseload has plummeted, for parents who are just managing to hold it all together. And there’s angst. About what might happen, what could happen. About the people in our lives who are at risk and the people we don’t know who are sick.

Yesterday was sunny and 72 degrees. This morning the sky filled with clouds and the temperature fell and by the afternoon a storm had rolled in. Tonight I writing to the sound of the wind blowing bits of water against glass and I’m taking a cue from Longfellow who said,

For after all, the best thing one can do

  When it is raining, is to let it rain.

( Photo by Jose Fontano on Unsplash )