Early in the morning several days ago I gathered all the courage I could muster and walked down the gravel lane that leads to our property, heading to the mailboxes to get the newspaper. If you’ve been reading the newspapers or paying any attention at all to the news lately, you know that things are not good. The world’s economy is tanking, human beings are doing violence to one-another, and the American Presidential election has gotten divisive and ugly. Just when you think the news can’t get any worse, it does.
Still, I saw evidence that morning that Mother Nature is an optimist.
I’d just removed the newspaper from its plastic delivery tube at the mailbox and was headed home when a light rain began to fall. The sun was rising over Puget Sound to the east and an amazing, beautiful, hopeful rainbow formed over the towering cedar trees in my neighbor’s pasture. I shot photograph after photograph and stood for quite some time, watching the rainbow as it remained in the sky, refusing to fade. I began to get wet from standing in the rain. I needed to get on with the tasks I had planned for my day but I didn't feel I should turn my back on the rainbow; if it was going to put on such a show, the least I could do was hang around and watch. More minutes passed. Reluctantly, I finally turned and headed indoors to get my breakfast and get to work.
As I went into the house, I checked the sky one last time. The rainbow was still there, as bright as ever.
