It was one of those giant crashes of thunder which woke me up early this morning. You know the kind I mean. . . . they hit so ferociously and are so deafening that your first reaction is to think, "I must have been hit by that one!" And then you wait for the sirens because even though you were not hit, you are pretty sure that somewhere close to you was. And this morning the sirens did come. And later I heard that a home across from a church which is about 5 blocks from my house got hit. No significant damage or injuries. Hard to believe given the decibel level!
Rousted from my sleep, the sound of the ensuing rain mounting a crescendo right outside the open windows of my tiny apartment, my mind immediately began buzzing with my schedule for the morning. Which was to leave my apartment on foot, walk to the Hall of Missions 6 blocks away, grab a golf cart and take it out to Lenna Hall to pick up the choir music and transport it to the Amphitheater in time for pre-service choir rehearsal at 9:15. My thoughts? 1. Will the golf cart be all wet, and should I take a towel to dry it off? 2. Do I need to run over to the amp and grab the tarps and bungee cords we bought for just this scenario? 3. Will the rain be over by the time I need to go? 4. If not, will it be a better idea to run up to the parking lot to get my car for the music? 5. Do I really have any intention of stepping one foot outside this apartment while lightening and thunder assault the community?
I sought my answers in technology. I went to my new favorite weather website: wunderground and brought up the radar. Yep. . . .there was a bright red little bugger of a blog right over Chautauqua. Scanning outward, it seemed to be the only bright red blob anywhere in the United States of America at that moment. And I could see the end in sight. So I chilled, got up, had breakfast, checked the radar again, and was happy to see that the rain had practically stopped by the time I was supposed to leave to go get the cart. I took a towel, wiped the thing off, picked up Nancy, and we got the music transported without incident.
However, once choir had started and I was manning the table to help choir members get their robes and music before the rehearsal, I decided to pull up "wunderground" on my phone. And low and behold, there was another red blob, recently arrived off Lake Erie, headed right towards us! What to do? Armed with information and trying to decide if it's better to tell people or not. I chose "not." After all, we were under cover, even if the sides to the amp are open to the elements.
And sure enough, right towards the end of rehearsal, as people were starting to gather in the amp for the service, the heavens opened up again. . .this time without too much drama in the lightening/thunder department. But TORRENTIAL rain!
Now here's why this is significant. Sunday, today, marks the beginning of Week 4 at Chautauqua. The theme this week is: Water Matters (In partnership with National Geographic). Yep. . . the theme is WATER. And more than any other time I've been here, the Institution has gone crazy with tying the theme to the week's activities. There are the 5 Water experts that will do the lectures in the amp each weekday morning at 10:45, the afternoon lectures will pursue the theme: Water: Life Source/Life Force. But also, the opera scenes on Saturday night were all on water themes. The orchestra concert this week will have music based on Water themes. The morning and evening church services today featured every conceivable hymn/anthem with a water theme. There's a huge fish tank on the plaza with fish from the Chautauqua Lake, live and swimming around and probably wondering what the hell they are doing in this tiny tank when they were so recently in the lake! All Water All the Time. That's this week.
And I suspect we're going to hear some painful realities this week. Because there are lots of people in the know who will tell you that oil and economy and nuclear proliferation and social issues are not the number one problem facing our world. Global access to clean water is. There is a water crisis brewing that is not being paid much attention to. And I suspect we're going to hear about it this week. That's Chautauqua for you. . . . making you painfully aware of really important issues that are just more convenient to ignore.
So this morning, to kick off the week. . . . the rains came down. In buckets. In torrents. In deluges. For a short amount of time. And then they stopped. A little bit creepy if you ask me.
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