It's raining tonight. The soft white noise of its tears hitting the trees and grass bring many memories to light.
A friend of mine asked recently why it is that dark clouds and stormy weather are symbols of depression. To them, rain brought contentedness, even joy.
It took me a while to respond, since I, too, find dark, cloudy, windy days more enjoyable than sunny ones and hadn't really thought about it.
Now that I was, I learned something about myself.
Depression is symbolized in such a way for a few reasons. The first being that it is the opposite of happy, usually depicted by the sun.
But it goes deeper than that. If you look at the sky on a rainy day, you see clouds, dark and tumultuous, like the thoughts of one who is depressed. Every drop of rain falling, another tear, another short-coming, another failure, mercilessly beating you into the ground. Every bolt of lightning a taunting glimpse of what happiness was. Every echo of thunder a roar of frustration. The rising water levels filled with torrents of despair or stagnating apathy and numbness. High winds channel self hate and self loathing outward in a pointless, violent rage at everything.
It all fits, doesn't it?
Misery loves company, and I sure do enjoy rainy weather. Seeing that, even nature can feel like I feel all the time, even if just for a while...
Beautiful piece here.
ReplyDeleteI think its more than that, too, though.
Most people are extroverts. Sunny, happy around people. They don't know what to do with themselves when they are alone. Rain encourages them to stay home, be alone, be introspective.
To your average extrovert, that sounds like hell.
To us introverts, it's a comfort. We WANT a bit of time to ourselves, with just our thoughts, a warm blanket (and cat) and some soup. That's our idea of heaven.
The rain washes things clean. It cleans the air and gets all the pollutants and allergens out. Those of us with allergies or asthma can breathe a little easier.