Full Moon

As a primary teacher, the general wisdom held that kids were more likely to act out and be a little weird when the moon was full. I've heard people in other caregiving professions make the same claim. Whether there is anything to it, or it is simply a self-fulfilling prophecy, I don't know. What I do know is that everything seems to run in cycles.

I've never lived right on the ocean, but I have lived not far from the beach a couple of times. Ocean tides rise and fall with great predictability ---- after all, tide schedules are published in newspapers and online. It's no secret that the moon waxes and wanes, the seasons come and go, our hearts beat steadily and our lungs require no consciousness to expand and contract.

With all the evidence of rhythm and cycle, it is no wonder that an event which falls far outside the norm makes humans and animals edgy. Where I live, we see it every year during hurricane season ---- and also during the winter if a bold meteorologist breathes the word snow. Anticipation rises, an excitement that needles the nervous system and causes unusual behaviors. Kids twirl, squeak, jump, giggle and clutch each other. Adults would do the same, but that's unseemly, so instead they stock up on essentials like bread, milk and beer, lay in a supply of batteries, and hit the social media sites.

Status updates! Exclamation points! Photos! Rumors!! And the sense that the unexpected is just around the corner, danger lurks and life is unpredictable. Anything could happen!!!

Never mind that life is always unpredictable, that anything could happen on any given day. We rely on the rhythms we know and understand to keep us safe and going forward. If I had to assess the risk of getting in the car every time I did it, I'd wind up cowering in my house. If I consulted actuarial charts (or even just the obits) every morning with an eye to my planned activities, I might never get out of bed.

Someone in our city was hit by a bus this week, and unfortunately he was killed. I often say, when drawing an example of an unexpected event, that "I could go out and get hit by a bus tomorrow!" It struck me as strange, and really sad, that someone actually did.

One week away from the "cataclysmic" election, we have a storm of unpredictable proportions. It's like a ready-made metaphor from heaven. It is making landfall right now, according to news reports. Millions of people are in the path it is expected to take, hunkered down and hopefully safe, but some folks will inevitably lose their homes, their livelihoods, their lives. Life stories are being altered right now; forever after, for them, time will be divided between 'before the storm' and 'after the storm'. It is out of rhythm, out of sync, and random in the way that natural disasters always are.

We here in the center of North Carolina have been spared the worst of it. Others will suffer. This is the type of event that causes physical changes, financial changes, and most of all, spiritual change. It is hard to survive destruction and not come face to face with the big questions: Why them? Why not me? After a lifetime of hard work, why is one person wiped out and another left intact? What is my response in the wake of such despair and destruction? Who helps? Who hinders or cheats? What is the Right thing to do?

There will weeks and months, if not years, of responding, rebuilding, renewal. Stories will emerge of heroism,  tragedy, luck and cruelty. Leaders of all stripes will bend the narrative to fit their own purposes ---- religious, political, social, educational. It will bring out the best in communities, and the worst.

What ultimately comes out, along with cockroaches, rats and diseases, are human beings being human.
As a writer, it's bonanza. As a person, it's another perspective on life.