Ike Wasn't All Good, But Ike Wasn't All Bad Either...

A hurricane in Huntsville

• I got to know my neighbors well. Instead of imagining what fits into their ambiguous personhoods, I now know kindness and warmth as pieces of their character. I know a bit about their lives and they know a bit about mine. They helped me; I helped them. We shared, we talked, we laughed, we worried . . . together.
• I had a great excuse to leave the doors and windows open and breach the barrier between manmade and God-made, recycled air and fresh air, constraint and freedom . . . well, anyway. At night, lying next to my open bedroom window, I relished the sounds usually partitioned from me- tree frogs calling to each other (my favorite), crickets generating song, the wind through the tree branches. Clatter I had learned as a child to be true night.
• Candles are warming. Who doesn't love a candlelit room?
• This is a given: quality time. As in time to be creative instead of leaving it to technology. We played the newlywed game. There were no newlyweds among us. Oh, and the songs we crafted about Hurricane Ike out of restless creativity? Priceless.
• If you give a mouse a cookie . . . My story: if you give a girl some bug bites, it will make her remember being always outdoors as a kid. If she remembers being outdoors as a kid, she will want to quietly reminisce about such romantic times. When she wants to quietly and gleefully reminisce, she will need a place in which to sit. If you offer her a place in which to sit, she will request a spot outside so she can feel the breeze. When she's outside entranced in historical thought, she'll become susceptible to bug bites . . . . . . . Being one with the outdoors was kind of nice. Certain aromas reunite some people with their past. I guess that's bug bites for me.
• I walked. Walking is great exercise. Also good for the mind and soul.
• I had one good barbeque. Best I've eaten in a while actually.
• I got to see all the residents of Huntsville. 'Cause they were at H.E.B. and Wal- Mart when I was.

So Ike, even though we already shared a name, we shared much more: trouble and calm, darkness and refreshing, bad and blessing. Through it all, Goodness prevailed.

A tree must slumber in the winter to be healthy again in the spring. Just like its branches become cracked, weathered, and lifeless, so we faced a solemn outlook. But also like green buds sprouting in the first Spring thaw, shoots of good found their way through our storm. You weren't all bad, Ike. You weren't good, but you weren't all bad either.