“When you have ever adopted a rainbow to its finish, it leads you to the bottom on which you’re standing.” ~Alan Cohen
There’s nothing extra exhilarating than driving in a Jeep via plenty of standing water. With every push ahead, my good friend Angela expertly maneuvered via huge puddles, sending fountain-like arcs of aquatic glory previous my passenger-side window.
This was pleasure to me.
It was a welcome reprieve contemplating the previous couple of years had unraveled in methods I by no means noticed coming. In truth, this watery marvel, cruising via the quaint streets of the beloved seashore island I referred to as house, was a uncommon outing for me.
I wouldn’t name myself a shut-in precisely, however if you happen to had noticed me out and about in current months, you may need likened it to a unicorn sighting—uncommon and a shock to the system. Uncommon, as a result of leaving my home required one thing apart from pajamas. Stunning, as a result of it meant I had in some way rallied after a morning of ugly crying.
Lately, the ugly cries got here much less continuously, however getting out the door nonetheless required cautious planning and a wholesome dose of optimistic self-talk. Angela, sensing all I had been via, didn’t try to fill the area between us with senseless chatter. She let the air breathe, permitting our hearts to settle right into a comforting silence.
And wouldn’t you realize it? In that silence, as we rolled ahead over the waterlogged street, a rainbow appeared.
It was magnificent. A full curve stretching throughout the sky, untouched by a single cloud. We each took it in, wordless at first, till Angela lastly spoke the thought we have been each holding:
“This has to imply brighter days are forward.”
I nodded, hoping with every thing in me that she was proper. Not only for our group, which had been pummeled by weeks of relentless storms, however selfishly, for me. I wanted this to imply one thing. The universe wouldn’t place one thing so breathtaking in my path if life wasn’t about to shift in a significant means… proper?
At that second, though I wasn’t prepared for it, a tiny doorway of hope cracked open in my coronary heart.
Angela pulled into my driveway, gave me a kind of deep, soulful hugs she’s identified for, and I stepped onto the sand-packed pavers, feeling one thing I hadn’t felt in a very long time: the chance of reduction.
However reduction by no means got here.
The following morning, I awakened anticipating transformation. I brushed my enamel, seemed within the mirror, and waited for the shift. After which it hit me. Nothing had modified.
Worse but, every thing that had as soon as shattered me remained intact, as if locked in a forgotten pause. My father was gone—eternally. And as an alternative of the readability or closure I had hoped for, I used to be left with the unsettling actuality that some items of life can by no means be absolutely mended.
By some unknown drive of grace, the years, months, and weeks main as much as our final conversations allowed them to be mild, even heat. A reminder that the love we shared, although imperfect, continued to maneuver freely in each instructions. And nonetheless, his sudden departure despatched shockwaves via my household, shifting fault traces in methods I couldn’t management. Unable to bear it, like a sea turtle surprised immobile after a sudden freeze warning, I collapsed inward and commenced my retreat from the exterior world.
Then, there was my future looming over me, a clean slate ready to be stuffed. My identification had been tethered to elevating my boys, however quickly, my nest can be empty.
I had no roadmap for what got here subsequent. I had tried to carve out a brand new path via writing and constructing a aware and self-compassionate group, however since my father’s demise, that dream and the vitality for it had pale.
My reflection met my gaze, unsure and hesitant. Fifty years etched into my pores and skin, wonderful traces tracing each laughter and fear, a strip of silver roots marking the passage of time, but I felt invisible in a world that had seemingly moved on.
What now, rainbow? What now?
And past the grief, past the exhaustion, there was one thing else.
Anger.
How dare that rainbow give me hope? How dare it let me imagine, even for a second, that issues have been about to get higher? I felt tricked, betrayed by my very own willingness to imagine in one thing past my struggling.
However as I spiraled deeper into my chasm of despair, one thing else took form on the sides of my soul. A fact so easy, so unshaken by my sorrow, that it stopped me in my tracks.
I lastly discovered the reality about rainbows.
Rainbows don’t exist to alter our lives. They don’t include guarantees or ensures. They don’t seem to be right here to inform us whether or not issues will get higher or keep the identical.
A rainbow’s solely goal is to light up what already exists. To take the peculiar and, for a fleeting second, drench it in colour. It doesn’t erase the rain, nor does it undo the storm. However it shifts our notion. It permits us to see the world, and ourselves, in a means that feels momentarily brighter.
And possibly, simply possibly, that’s sufficient.
Possibly therapeutic isn’t about ready for all times to alter however about studying to be with life precisely as it’s. Possibly it’s about making area for the total spectrum of our feelings—grief and marvel, despair and hope, ache and sweetness—while not having to drive one away to make room for the opposite.
Possibly the rainbow was by no means a promise of transformation. Possibly it was merely an invite to see my life, my grief, and even myself via a unique lens.
And so, as an alternative of cursing the rainbow for failing to repair me, I let it train me one thing else.
That I’m nonetheless right here.
That even in grief, I can expertise awe.
That even in uncertainty, marvel can nonetheless discover me.
That even within the hardest moments, mild doesn’t disappear. It refracts, scattering in methods I won’t have anticipated however nonetheless can select to see.
And possibly, simply possibly, hope isn’t about believing one thing exterior will come alongside to save lots of us. Possibly hope is just the braveness to maintain going, even once we don’t but see the trail forward.
So, I’ll maintain going.
Not as a result of I do know what’s subsequent.
Not as a result of I imagine every thing will all of a sudden fall into place.
However as a result of there may be nonetheless mild on this world. Gentle that’s lovely, redemptive, and multi-faceted, and I need to maintain trying to find it.
Even within the rain.
Even within the in-between.
Even in me.
About Diana DeVaul
Diana DeVaul, MSW, is a author and seeker who believes within the therapeutic energy of shared fact. Whereas transferring via her personal season of uncertainty, she presents trustworthy and compassionate phrases to anybody struggling to seek out regular floor. Learn extra at dianadevaul.com.
