stormy times

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The second onslaught of snow is making itself felt this morning. My wife, who works in a medical office, got a call early ... the place would be closed. No word on where patients were expected to go or how they might get there. Under the street lamp, the flakes eddy and swirl. The cars look like blurred and patient buffalo shouldering  lashes of whipped cream.

Complaints do not improve the scene, but it is hard not to make comparisons. If we think we've got it bad, consider the cyclone-wracked parts of Australia:

"There's no crying, no hysterics," said Alcorn, 42. "It's going to be loud, it's going to be scary. But we've got each other."

The first of Cyclone Yasi's winds began howling throughout Cairns as night fell Wednesday, with the storm expected to make landfall sometime between 10 p.m. and midnight. Winds at the center of the storm were gusting up to 186 mph (300 kph), and the front was about 300 miles (500 kilometers) across. The worst winds were expected to last up to four hours, though blustery conditions and heavy rain could last for 24 hours.  -- Complete story.

One hundred eighty-six miles per hour, "but we've got each other." It is humane and touching and yet it is hard not to notice that when the winds get fierce enough, even "each other" is blown away. And when there is no "each other," isn't this the very time in which to actualize an honest friendship?
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