I’ve been thinking a lot about the question that I posed on Monday: How would you represent hope visually? It’s a tough one. I’ve looked at the pink blossoms of the cherry trees and the bulbs that are starting to sprout. I’ve admired our amazingly sunny days and the promise that when the rain returns, it will bring even more flowers. These are all unmistakable symbols of hope, but still don’t capture my experience.
When I stopped looking so hard for it, the answer was obvious: clouds. After living in Seattle for a year, I realized that one of the ways I cope with all the rain is to notice the ever-changing clouds. Their colors, density and position in the sky take dramatic shifts throughout each day. Unless the sky is a uniform gray, there’s always something to admire.
Like the clouds, sometimes my pain is light; other times it is unbearable and accompanied by a host of other symptoms. The changes occur from day to day, but also from hour to hour. Even on these days, I catch glimpses of blue sky; there’s always something to be thankful for, something to enjoy.
Plenty of my days are perfectly described by the dense, dark gray overhead. I’ve become grateful for the variations in my headache clouds. They give me hope that headaches won’t destroy my joy. Even if I have a headache every day of the rest of my life, the subtle changes within a day make me appreciate every moment I have.
(P.S. My questions wasn’t rhetorical, but I know the answer isn’t easy to find. If you have any thoughts about your own or some general symbols of hope, please share them in the comments. Other readers and I value what you have to share.)
Birds. I don’t really know why, except that when I see a flock of egrets flying across a dark sky, or the annual robin invasion, birds just make me feel hopeful.
Music can do it too.
What a beautiful post Kerrie!
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Thanks for sharing your source of hope and for the kind words. It’s all about learning to cope, isn’t it?
K