The Stormchaser

There is a tempest that grows off the shore, spurned by the deep heated wetness. The waves swell, pushed by winds and rains, which turn and turn, gaining momentum, and seeking a foothold on land where its massive potential energy can be unleashed into a howling maelstrom. The wind cycles, cascading over the eye's center, down... down... and then violently back up again. Repeating over and over, growing stronger and faster each time, so fast and so high that the rain flashes to ice in a second before crashing down into the center again.

In the distance, the sirens wail and the flags rigidly point inland, foretelling the inevitable coming. The beaches are quiet, no one to watch the willows bend low in sublimation. There is a relentlessness that is frightening, and yet it is simultaneously exciting and mesmerizing. This wall of energy. This mass of motion. This fury of nature.

Most will flee, hiding behind closed doors and boarded windows. Some will leave completely, moving inland to calmer ports where the rain falls straight down and the wind gusts are caresses. But a few will try to weather the tempest standing before them, longing for its landfall to take them and press its wind and rain and power against them. Some call them brave... others call them foolhardy.

I remember storms like this. Of being the foolhardy one.

But now I live inland.