ALONG THE WAY

Passing Chiricahua Storm Leaves a Place of Peace and Comfort

THE LOOMING AUGUST storm simmered over the expanse of grassland and above the jagged Chiricahua Mountains as the sun played hide-and-seek with the clouds. The tempest beset the spired mountains, patient giants awaiting the disruption of their tranquility. I had come to Chiricahua National Monument in southeast Arizona looking for a bit of peace. Desiring the sweet air of a wilderness paradise, it never occurred to me that I would flee the storm of my own life, only to drive headlong into another. Summer means monsoon, so the storm closing in on the Chiricahuas shouldn't have surprised me. As the clouds shredded across the peaks and prepared to spit with a vengeance, I thought I knew what I was in for. A little rain couldn't possibly rival the intensity of my doubts about succeeding as a fighting-for-survival single mother of two-the "storm" I drove there to escape.inched around the final curve and searched the asphalt for signs of white lines. Finally parked, I listened to the pelting rain for almost two hours as an ocean poured down on my world. The sounds seeped into the crevices of my thoughts like the echoing doubts of my parenting abilities. The rocks stood in strict defiance of the rain, luring me at intervals to stand open-faced in the elements, stupefied at the intensity of wind and water, before racing back, shivering, to the warmth of the car.

The spires and spikes made me see a lone Apache Indian, pine-tree-tall and rough around the edges, sitting in silent intensity. The Apaches call this place the "land of the standing up rock." The mountains have grown to resemble the Apaches' children, just as my children have grown to resemble me, struggling to survive the changes of life.

I barely made it to the parking lot entrance at Massai Point before the bloated and irritated sky spewed its beautiful hostility on the mountains below. I hunkered close to the wheel, practically kissing the windshield and cursing the obscuring fog of my breath on the cold glass. With windshield wipers going full blast, I After the storm passed, I started the drive down the mountain, longing to follow the rage of the rain that echoed my doubts. After about 2 miles, I noticed a car parked on the side of the road. As I passed, a young couple stood frozen, ogling something I couldn't see. Unable to resist, I pulled over and climbed out of my car. As I stepped under the cover of the trees, cold drips like icy fingers poked my flesh. I could still hear the thunder, even though the clouds had passed.

I gazed in the direction the couple was looking. It wasn't the storm I was hearing at all. A river of pure chocolate rainwater gushed and swirled down the mountainside, twisting and cutting through the rocks, determined to forge its own path to the grasslands below. It collected in pockets where the sheer force churned and mixed it until froth formed across the top, like a giant mocha cappuccino waiting for the thirsty Apache giant.

As the water spent its wild energy falling from the sky, it now took its wrath to the ground and ate through the brown earth, jutting around or over rocks, then crossing the road to continue its journey. The earth lay helpless, exactly as it had when the waters fell from skies and eroded the rocky landscape so long ago. I played leapfrog with the couple in the car the rest of the way down. We pulled over to soak up one more look at the churning river.

As I headed home, with the peaks of the Chiricahuas in the rearview mirror, I remembered the reason I came my escape from the struggle of simple survival. And I recognized something about those spires. They are the same as I. Weathered. Solitary. Survivors. What remains when the storm passes-land scarred by the water's ferocity or the human soul scarred by hardships-is the center of peace. So in the end it is the storm that creates the place where you can walk in comfort, protected from the poundings of the past.

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