In rainbows

Today as I was driving home the sun was shining and light rain was falling. Although I should have been paying attention to the road, I was distracted by this huge rainbow in the sky. After a crazy-hectic-beautiful day at work, the rainbow just lit up my face.

It was so close. I started chasing it. In my head I kept saying, "This is awesome, I'm about to be at the end of the rainbow!" Silly thought, but for a second I literally believed it. I laughed and realized what I was doing.

And that I do it

all

the

time:

chasing something beautiful when it's not meant to be chased. The purpose of a rainbow, if you could say something like a rainbow has a purpose, is not to be touched, but admired from afar. Why am I trying to fit it in a box and keep it forever? It's temporary and beautiful and I should enjoy it for the moment I've been blessed with it.

So I started enjoying it. I observed it carefully, watching every change. Sometimes it would fade in and out, hidden behind gray clouds. If I had been caught up in clenching it in my fists, this would have frustrated the hell out of me. But because I chose to I accept it for what it was and just let it be what it's been created to be, the fade in and out was awesome and beautiful. And it really was.

I got curious about how the sky would look if I removed my shades, and I was once again thrown off my game by the rainbow. Sunglasses on: iridescent beauty. Sunglasses off: nothing. Absolutely nothing. The sky looked dismal and gray-green; no rainbow in sight. I thought about all the people not wearing sunglasses who were driving home from their jobs, talking on their cell phones, singing to the music blaring on their stereos, stressing and grumbling about the traffic...and completely missing the beauty in front of them. Shit...without a doubt there were drones who were wearing sunglasses who didn't see it either! An incredible shame. Have I done that? Have I been that person? Have I rushed through beautiful moments in my life missing them completely because my mind was not in the now? Because my mind was in a different place? Have I missed out on an intimate interaction with someone whom God has brought into my life for just a brief moment, simply because I was too busy fretting over the unchecked items on my petty checklist of tasks?

I fell in love with this rainbow today. And although I might have been thinking like an overly-philosophical existentialist nerd, I loved every thing that it meant to me in that moment. It correlated perfectly with the day I had today and how I decided to stop teaching my difficult class and just BE with them today. To get to know them. It was great. I came to love them and learn more about them in the 45 minutes we had class together, than in the entire 8 weeks we've known each other.

So...God, thank you for rainbows. :) And thank you for giving me a moment of clarity and careful eyes to see one today.