Rock Dance

The rain abruptly ceased. For many long hours, it had waged a furious war of attrition against our rooftop, ultimately losing out to a patchwork of tightly packed grey slate slabs, and the sloping contours of our home.

"Let's go see!"

I followed her outside, giddy like a child, to witness the havoc such a torrential rain had wreaked on our garden. The carnage was not as grotesque as I had feared. The soaked wood of our cherry deck appeared simultaneously dull and glimmering in the post-tempest half-light. It was one of those storms where the clouds hung low and menacing for hours following, as if threatening to break again. A deep and thunderous grey, tumultuous and beckoning, it diffusely reflected any light incident upon it, while glittering raindrops which clung to every surface winked back. We stepped softly, so as not to disturb the silence that followed the storm. Not a bird, nor squirrel, nor person made a sound. Not a single gust or drifting column of air blew past our cheeks. It was if the storm, in its rage, had taken with it every sound that the earth lifted to the sky, save the drip-drop of water as it streamed down the leaves of the surrounding trees.

Our orchids were unharmed. Delicate though they may be, they had weathered the storm as it rained fire down upon them. They stood, drooping low with the weight of water on their petals. They were Blue Lady orchids, with deep cobalt leaves that seemed to glow in the grey light.

The trees were something to behold. Great oaks, whose leaves ordinarily took on the flat green of chlorophyll, had adopted an almost supernatural vibrance. Their leaves teaming with bulbous orbs of scintillating water, it was as if we were gazing up into a vast starscape, except the velvety blackness of space had been replaced with a wild collage of emerald and jade.

But perhaps most intriguing, were the rocks that adorned our garden. A little larger than a beachball and half buried in a desert of mulch, they were composed of a smattering of greys and tans. Ordinary stones, no doubt.

"Look at how they shine!"

We waded through the soft, spongy grass, our feet soaked and cleansed as they dragged through the miniature forest below. The rocks had darkened as the water stripped away their skin of dirt and dust, revealing below a simultaneously beautiful and ordinary complexion of swirls and spots. The colors had acquired a profound depth, as though each patch was its own glacial lake of earthy tones. The aroma of water mingling with dry dirt and mulch wafted slowly through us as we crouched to examine the stones.

They were surprisingly warm to the touch, as if they had just emerged from a dip in a hazy lake. Despite their smooth appearance, as I drew my finger across the top of one particular stone, their microscopic roughness was revealed to me. I could feel even the smallest rut or divot as the stone pulled against my finger, evidence of the life that it had lived. A life of hard knocks, and stern lessons in the impermanence of physical presence. Rough sections yielded to smoother stone, then back to roughness. It was a wondrous ensemble of ordinary imperfections, beautiful in the way they came together to fabricate a stone entirely unique in its form.

I was interrupted from my musings by a shout of joy. She had summited the rock adjacent to mine, beckoning me to join her atop the world of our garden. I pulled myself up, and found that the recently discovered roughness dragged pleasingly against the soles of my bare feet. The infinitesimal clasts lightly tickled my toes, as if holding me tightly to ensure that I wouldn't fall.

She was the first to move. She jumped to the next rock, her hair vortex of dusky flaxen as she landed, nearly losing her balance.

"Come on!"

We jumped from rock to rock, performing our inelegant rock dance, as though we were young children playing hopscotch. There was joy in action, and each movement had its own specific brand of delight. There was the exhilaration of pushing off of one boulder, taking flight. There was the freedom of floating, liberating in its novelty and brevity. And there was the surety and comfort of the return to familiarity, our feet kissing the ground as the sensation of weight returned us to earth. And so, we waltzed on the rocky arm of the spiral galaxy in our garden.

And above us, the upside-down smile of a dim rainbow watched us serenely as our giggles broke the stoic silence of the earth.