Krakatoa and the Cloudburst

When the cloud is ready to burst, or when  the fault line has been developing pressure and is ready to shift,  the changes happen quickly. Accumulated energy can be kept in check only so long. As the two sides of the fault line strain in opposition, we can pinch the boulders together and try to hold back the earthquake, but it will not be denied indefinitely. When it lets go, all hell breaks loose as though it only just happened this very moment. Not so. It has been happening for a very long time.

There is a series of gradual collapses. Each one a revelation and an invitation to grow and change. Each one is also an invitation to denial and avoidance. Maybe there is a fight, or an outside stressor, or the straw that makes the camel really lose their shit. Again. Then there is soothing. Apology. Retreat. Negotiation. The cycle begins again.

Then one day, Krakatoa is not content to huff and puff, but needs to explode and sink beneath the waves.  There is an orgasm of destruction. Finality.

That day came for me this summer. After so many rehearsals, it was show time. I had extreme stage fright that was only overcome by the Krakatoan energy of the day. Shaking mad. Grief stricken. Aware. After a long sleepless night, I said what I had to say. What I had not been able to say previously. I walked away afterward, feeling the death and the liberation.

The unsticking was sudden and I am not the same. I've done things that I never could have seen myself doing. I've scarred myself and others. Smoke and leaning timbers. Craters. Hurts that will last a life time. Absence. Loss. A mountain gone. How can a mountain just be gone?

There's also the cloudburst. One morning in early August, I woke up a changed person. Sweetness, joy. Rain inside me. A warm deluge of relief, sadness, exuberance, awareness that we aren't destined to stay stuck even if it's messy, sharp certainty of big change where there had only been vague dread of things staying in the same stagnant swamp forever.

The cloudburst makes things turn green and move toward the sun. It feels very good to be alive.