Chapter Two: All our strength.

Mother Nature and I weren't the best of friends; she snows and I wish for warmth. The sun glares down at me, and I think fondly of December when the sun cooled down. I couldn't even spend half an hour outdoors in her embrace before said embrace began to feel more like a death hold and I retreated beyond glass windowpanes and wooden walls.

Mother Nature and I weren't the worst of enemies, either. When she sends pounding rain that drives itself against the house with the sound of a hundred pattering feet, I feel comforted and at home. Flowers bloom and butterflies bask in the glow of them, getting drunk on the nectar and I watch from a distance, longing for that grace and elegance.

Hurricanes and tornadoes rip their way through the land, yet while people lost homes and died all I could think of was what an awe-inspiring power that was. Earthquakes, mudslides, floods and lightning strikes and tsunamis all coming together to play their part in a symphony of ordered chaos, with her at the podium.

Everything humans are, everything we've been and will be is cared for by Mother Nature. We have a key role to play in her realm, if we could just find our scripts and get to working. As it is we're fumbling it all. As it is, we have become a terminal illness for this world.

Now, I realize, it's up to us to cure her.

If only to hold on to those winter nights where silence envelopes all, and fat white flakes slowly drift to earth, reminding us of her gentler side. If only for spring mornings when all of nature unfurls itself at once. If only for fireflies and peaceful sunsets and falling leaves, and purely selfish reasons.

We must hold on to her with all our strength.