Summer time memories: Summer transcendence

   Five years ago, I was on holiday visiting my family in London. Summer in Europe is germutlich, warm and reassuring. It is a great time to relax, going to the beach and being in the company of my cousins and friends. I always look forward to summer. In the words of Teresa of Avila, my favourite 16th century mystic: "Anyone who works all year round badly needs relaxation." And to those who often criticized her, she simply said: "Don't take this amiss. But we need everything that helps to make life more bearable." The time flies quickly. That summer I was reading Leo Tolstoy's, War and Peace. I came across one quotation that captured those days pondering life's mysteries: "Love is life. All, all that I understand, I understand only because I love... Love is God and dying means for me a particle of love, to go back to the universal and eternal source of love."
   Before returning to the US, I phoned a friend from Louisiana who said to me: "Better stay where you are. Hurricane Gustav hit our area hard!" Nonetheless, I returned gingerly, totally unprepared for the destruction that had taken place. From a glorious summer in London, I heard untold stories of pain and confusion. In the midst of fallen trees, the sky seemed so pristine. A week later, another hurricane, Ike by name, raged through where I lived. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita had come and gone. Few outside Louisiana wanted to hear about Gustav and Ike. I remembered collecting shingles that flew off the roof of my little house, cleaning busted window panes and consoling myself, "I had absolutely nothing to worry about." The same sky that radiated the European summer looked ravishingly beautiful. Strangely enough that thought drew me out of myself. Self-transcendence as one writer describes, is what really counts. In poetic form, I penned hurricane Gustav's encounter with Terrebonne, the area I lived, as a brief passionate summer love. Here is part of it:
                                                 "all that I touch,
                                                  all that I know,
                                                  all that I try, is love.
                       But why speak of love when destruction
                       enters as the summer continues. ..."

The sky, I consoled myself that year, is still here. That little bit of
transcendence gives us hope.      +Don Ronaldo