Nature Journal 11


Storm
            There was a large thunderstorm on campus the other night. It was the first time I had ever actually heard the wind howl. Now, I have heard the wind before, but this was the first time that it actually frightened me. It seemed angry and cruel. I felt as if it was trying to blow the bricks away just so it could try and strangle me. Then it paired itself with the rain, the icy, quick rain that seemed to be tiny beads thrown at the world by some higher power. There were brilliant streaks of white lighting piercing the dark void of night and that was immediately followed by the clapping of a cacophonous thunder. If the wind was the howling, then the thunder was the bark and I was there to stare down the wolf because there was no escaping the pack.
            The beauty of the natural world is only challenge by its power. The beauty of nature is easy to discuss and admire, but the power and destructive forces are less prone to literature. I think that is because it reminds us that nature is more than simply a place to go to find solace or to meditate. It is more than beautiful desert arches or gentle streams and a cool pine forest. Nature is wild, untamed and big, unbelievably big. There is a power in nature that both scares and mesmerizes us. We love the nature that we know, the nature that we can control. The storms scare me, but it should not any more than the oak tree, they both part of the same system, the same nature, the nature of which I am a part.

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