Powerless

This is one corner of our front garden after the men of the close spent the day clearing up, attempting to restore order. The road sign a gift of the storm.

At first light the council clean-up crew arrived. Their trucks sucked all the rocks, stones, tree trunks and general garbage from the street outside - it's never looked so clean. I hosed down all the paths, windows and the close itself so we are no longer crunching sand underfoot and into the house, so we can see out the windows again.

We lost power around teatime yesterday, a neighbour's house had caught fire when flood water shorted their electrics and the power was switched off on our street till all danger was past, around midnight.

Powerlessness a salutary reminder of how many diversions and distractions depend on heat and light. Last night I spent the six hours breathing, meditating, reflecting on my earlier panic and today on our human responses to being confronted by powers greater than our small selves. Such a little local difficulty in the scheme of things (friends who live but a street uphill had no idea what was happening at the water's edge till they saw the destruction on the TV news last night) and such a very human urge to restore the familiar. Chastened, softened.

I've also been wondering about Japan three years after the tsunami. Here are some comparison photographs,. taken before and after their cleanup. When images of the tsunamai hit our screens I sat just over the wall from the spot above and thought these thoughts life seems to be a continuing education in imagination, in empathy, in understanding.