Here comes the flood. And there it goes ...

Peter Gabriel's song, "Here Comes the Flood" isn't about the seven inches of rain which deluged the Greater Chicagoland area, producing epic flooding and millions of dollars worth of damage this past week.  It's not about how my husband and I ran downstairs at 4 o'clock in the morning on April 18, grabbing anything on a low-resting shelf that could perish in the rushing waters.  And it's not about the flood of tears I cried when I realized a box of old 78s my dad had collected since the 1940s sat soaking for at least twelve hours before being found.

It's about a dream Gabriel had about people being able to see each other's thoughts, which produced a kind of psychic flood.  "A mental flood", as Peter himself put it.

After our physical flood, I started taking stock of what items were lost or damaged and realized that, truly, the losses could've been a lot worse (like the ones suffered during our 2010 flood, where the water, a foot deep, sat for 24 hours, and turned childhood treasures into lumps of mashed potatoes).  But the things that were lost or wounded held memories and energies that are now dimmed or lost.  It's for those intangibles that I cry the most.

I can't sit and think of the energies attached to the collection of 78s without being flooded with images of my dad, a young pup of twenty or so, handling the black vinyl platters with great care, cataloguing and storing them with steady purpose.  The only thing that keeps me from crumbling is knowing the discs themselves have been cleaned and will survive another 70 years.

The energy of the water streaming through our suburbs were just what they were: rushing, flooding, without malice or agenda.  It's just what it does.  We attach the feelings by how it affects us and our belongings.  And so we wear our thoughts outwardly.  And sometimes we blog about them and people, indeed, can see them.  I doubt this is what Gabriel had in mind when he wrote down the dream and formed it into song, but it's still quite vivid and strong.

So I'm sitting here, watching the rain pour outside the cafe, strangely calm.  My flood of emotions has subsided.  My feelings and thoughts on the subject have crested.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ww9JS8dJ9fY