Hurricane Irma Thoughts
The true testament of letting go is when dealing with nature’s volatility. There is literally nothing you can do to stop a hurricane or change its course. The predictions, given ahead of time, help to reduce the potential alternatives and prepare, but they are not guaranteed until the hurricane makes a new choice along its path. Hurricane Irma was a lengthy exercise in doing your best with what you’ve got and waiting to see what the actual outcome is. This post focuses on some thoughts I had during the experience.
Trying to quantify the meaning of your life and its comforts, in a few carry-able boxes isn’t the easiest. You don’t really understand the feeling until you are forced to make these decisions in your life. Leaving a house, wondering if it’s going to be the same when you return. When I was younger, I don’t remember the feeling like I have the memory of now. I don’t think I thought about the effects as much because I figured it’d be okay, or maybe I didn’t have as much to lose and be concerned over. (Not to say, the pure hopefulness of ‘whatever happens, will be okay’ isn’t still valuable.) I think you can miss things, and not be materialistic. Materials aren’t the most meaningful, but they can have a lot of meaning. It made me look at things in a new way: “am I willing to lose this over that? Would I be okay if I never see this again?” When you have tools, materials, and portfolio pieces that support your creative work, the conundrum can be even more daunting. You make things; you have more things that you’ve invested into your work / business. You have to look at the value and what you need. What do you need that funds your professional endeavors, that shows your best effort, that keeps you doing even if there are set-backs? Having a list, or designated bin, where you keep these things is important, especially in a time where you have to make these decisions quickly. Infamous saying, but seriously-- Don’t take anything for granted.
The sound of nothing is different than silence. Silence is the nonexistence of sound. The sound of nothing is when normalcy runs away; it’s the vacant absence of the controlled chaos of everyday. No movement. No cars. No people. No birds or animals in the trees. Yet, the earth’s still there, the weather’s still there, and you’re still there. It’s an eerie sense that you shouldn’t be here either perhaps, in a microcosm of latent apocalypse. The troubling factor is the fact that you can’t see anything, but you can hear the unidentifiable bellows and falls from outside, in the night. There’s nothing else to do, except wait among the wind and sheets of rain. Then there’s a new quiet that emerges afterwards. It’s no longer nothing, but the early stages of another day. To see a bird fly past after the storm passed, and sit on an intact tree branch, was its own tiny joy. It’s a daily occurrence that usually goes unnoticed or unconcerned. In this circumstance, it gives you the comfort of knowing that it’s the time to begin again.
I’m fortunate that what happened to me was not the worst. My thoughts and heart are with those who are severely affected by these storms. Luckily enough, the damage we encountered was mainly superficial: torn screens, broken branches. This damage, however, there was a rare opportunity, from an artistic perspective. There was something magical at the chance to use the damage with the remnants of Irma’s winds to create art. (And, hopefully a short film soon.) They look unreal, how solids can appear like paint. The fortuitous randomness within a 1/1000 shutter to catch a certain angle or fold in mid-motion during 40 mph gusts. It was mesmerizing to watch the screens curl and float through the changing winds. In any instant, the tears become something new. The air, the sculptor, constructing new streaks and dancing ribbons, with every squall.
The point is-- these shots are captured, because you take the moment to capture them. This is what, I think, makes a person a growing and improving artist. To take opportunities, to look for potential where others see the opposite. Hurricanes are not fun, or to be taken lightly. As a lover of nature, there is, however, something fascinating about natural phenomenon. Hurricanes come and go, they disintegrate in the path of adversity (which is land, and thankfully so). They break up into the air and water in which they formed. People remain, though. People survive and go through the mess disasters leave. People move forward and even then they encounter other troubles and setbacks throughout their lives. These new difficulties nonexistent to the former cyclonic destroyers. People create hope from despair. People keep going, and that’s the strongest force of all. So, keep creating.