A Translucent Network of Minimal Surprises

The storm chez moi: One tree was lost on our street, and a downed branch in the Hall’s Pond Sanctuary

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Years of solitude had taught him that, in one’s memory, all days tend to be the same, but that there is not a day, not even in jail or in the hospital, which does not bring surprises, which is not a translucent network of minimal surprises.

–Jorge Luis Borges*

Our encounter with Irene here in Brookline MA was minimal. A tree fell across the street, and the Town of Brookline had it sawed and gone in an hour. Branches, some of them large, fell in the quiet pond sanctuary across the road. But no power outages here, unlike friends in Virginia and North Carolina.

While I am not trivializing the damage and discomfort caused by the storm, it did bring its own translucent network of minimal surprises: The reassuring solidarity that comes when everyone is participating in a larger-than-life event; the quality of light when the storm finally passes through (Is it an ionizing of the air? There is something is different about the way light is reflected post storm); A day spent slowly and mostly indoors; The disruptive but sober reminder that we are in fact tiny creatures on this planet. Perhaps we should consider ourselves just guests here.

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*Thanks once again to Whiskey River for this great quote.