A dark and stormy day...
Thunderstorms used to terrify me as a child. I remember waking up in the middle of the night in my grandparents farmhouse because thunder would shake the walls of the house. I would jolt awake, too petrified to move. Following the rolls of thunder, the lightning would light up my room just faintly enough so that my stuffed animals would cast eerie looking shadows around my walls. I would eventually scream for Nanny, or on the nights that I was brave enough, I would run down the upstairs hallway and dive into my grandparents bed. The older I got, the less I was afraid, but there was still an uneasiness accompanying them.
Fast forward to September 2004 - my senior year in high school. I remember getting ready for school one rainy morning when my father (who had already left for work) called me. With hesitation in his voice, he told me that my best friend (who was in the U.S. attending college while we were still stationed overseas in Germany) had been reported missing. Hurricane Ivan had hit a few days prior, and the last anyone had heard of Matt, he was traveling through Louisiana at the same time Ivan had touched land. He never made it to Texas to see his family. Two days later is when his mother reported him missing, and a couple of days after that is when rescue authorities pulled his car out of the ocean with the driver’s side window rolled down and no sign of him. He was my big brother. He taught me how to play soccer, let me cry on his shoulder when my parents divorced, and he took me for ice cream and let me vent when my boyfriend and I broke up. He even stood in line for hours to make sure I had a ticket to see X2: X-Men United when it came out in theaters. He was my best friend, and I was devastated.
Ever since this dark and stormy day my senior year, thunderstorms no longer seem to frighten me. I could not imagine what was going through his mind in his last moments, but me fearing a thunderstorm seemed so minuscule after knowing what he must have gone through. From that day on, I decided to welcome the thunderstorms. I used something that caused me fear and turned it around so that the fear no longer held me. Thunderstorms are a reminder that no matter what storm each of us is going through, someone else could be going through something worse. While some of us are weathering little rainstorms, there are others withstanding hurricanes.
Here’s to you, Matt, for helping me make it through each stormy day.