What the Lightning Taught Me

The summer storm rolled in just as I finished my morning coffee on the porch. Lightning flashed across the sky, that familiar crack illuminating the old oak tree in the yard—much like the one I watched sixty years ago from my parents' farmhouse porch.

That summer of 1958, my brother and I spent every afternoon swimming in the old swimming hole we called our pool. It was really just a deep bend in the creek where the water gathered cool and clear, but to us, it was paradise. We'd dive until our fingers wrinkled, racing across the surface like our lives depended on it.

Papa's prize bull, ol' Hercules, would graze on the hillside above the creek. That creature taught me more about patience than any sermon I've heard. You couldn't rush Hercules. You moved at his pace, or you didn't move at all. Some days, getting him from pasture to barn took an hour of gentle guidance, slow steps, and understanding.

Mama's barn cat, Whiskers, had her own wisdom. She'd watch Hercules with those yellow eyes, never approaching, never troubling the beast, yet somehow they shared an understanding—the big bull and the small cat, each respecting the other's territory.

The day the lightning struck, I was twelve. A storm like this one, sudden and fierce. I watched from the porch as Hercules stood calmly in the field, while Whiskers had already wisely tucked herself in the barn. The bolt hit the old willow tree not fifty yards from where the bull stood. Hercules never flinched. He knew something I didn't—that panic wouldn't save him, but steadiness might.

Now, sitting on my own porch, watching the grandchildren run inside as thunder rumbles, I understand what the old bull knew. Life's storms come and go. What matters is how you stand through them—steady, patient, like Hercules. Wise enough to seek shelter when needed, like Whiskers. Brave enough to dive into life's deep waters, like we did in our pool.

The lightning flashes again. The rain begins to fall, gentle and nourishing. Some things, I've learned, never really change. We just grow into the wisdom that was always there, waiting for us to notice it.