Eye of the Storm

Navigating through Hell and Falling into Grace

Gustave Doré’s Dramatic Illustrations of Dante’s Divine Comedy

The foreboding gloom indicates the torrential monsoon is about to hit the Eastern Ghats. Here, the monsoon arrives in manic rage with the sky clad in menacing grey. The ghostly white downpour impedes all necessary routines of life. Life stands still in limbo and allows nature to have its way with reality. No one interferes, no one argues, no one complains. Everyone, everything, waits with indefinite longing, for it to be over. For the storm to pass, for life to continue, to exist without the imminent threat of extinction. The black soil rejoices as the monsoon quenches its thirst. The critters, the fishes, the flowers, and the climbers are waiting within their nests to explode into a new life. From the resting slumber, all life revives, after the monsoon sweeps through the Eastern Ghats. I was here during the summer, and I left thinking I wouldn’t be back until next spring, but here I am. My family is navigating the specifi…