upper level atmospheric disturbances
by Elouise
Upper level atmospheric disturbances
Pound my body invade my dreams
Mess with my heart beat
Vision
Balance
Food
The right food
Fast
Routine tasks become
Dizzying exercises
What do I need to do next
Flighty whims
Distract
Feet wander
Want to go
Elsewhere
Keep it simple
One thing at a time
Ditch everyday routines
Stay alert
Long enough to swallow
What is most precious
Everything else can wait
No matter how beguiling
Or promising
You know the drill
Do it
This can pass
If you don’t pass out
Or forget 9-1-1
This event took place when I woke up this morning. D was out for several hours at a meeting. I wrote this free verse after doing all the right things and waiting for them to kick in and rescue my disoriented body. Which they did.
Last night and today we’re getting a quick, stormy one-two pounding from a massive weather front. My body already feels it, even though the sun is shining through the clouds. By tonight it will be over and done with.
Why write about this? Because it’s a challenging part of living in my body. Yes, God created me with this body. Yes, others had their hand at shaping some of what happens in and through my body.
Yet it’s larger than that. It’s about learning to live responsibly in God’s mysteriously interconnected universe. Honoring its sometimes unpredictable impact on my already fragile human life–a precious gift.
I don’t like going through things like this by myself. I would prefer having D here with me, even though I’m a fairly independent woman. Some things come easily. Taking care of myself immediately when this particular syndrome kicks is not one of them.
I greatly prefer waiting it out until I feel better. Hoping it will dissipate. I don’t want to look like a fool–even to myself. Being proactive on my own behalf feels like over-reacting. I’ll just wait until it’s really bad….or goes away. Denial? Who, me? I’m still learning the drill.
© Elouise Renich Fraser, 23 June 2015
Image from eos.org
Telling the Truth 
This blog reminds me of an event when I was in grade school only a few years after this picture of me was taken. I was awakened earlier that usual – the wind was howling fiercely. I looked out the window at the tree just outside my window. it was spring and the tree had been full of leaves, but all I saw was a tree with bare branches. My older brothers would have been in the milking barn milking the cows. I learned later after I dressed that the milking barn had been shaken so violently that Paul and Corky thought it might collapse so they chased the cows out into the barnyard. Hail had destroyed all the crops. Dad was planning to cut a field of oats for hay in the next day or two, but it had been completely flattened. I’ve never since been in such a violent storm.
I don’t remember being frightened – just amazed.
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Great memory, Waldo. To me it sounds like the end of the world! It’s a wonder you weren’t frightened. Nature has a way of knocking us right to the ground–awesome and horrifying all at the same time. It puts things and people into perspective. We’re so vulnerable. I’ve never experienced howling wind and hail the way it seems to be happening in the Mid and Southwest this summer. Thanks for sharing this memory from, I’m guessing, the late 1930s.
Elouise
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