Arrival: Part IV (Cloudbusting I)
Kate Bush has been one of my favorite musicians since 1984. I remember hearing ‘Wuthering Heights’ and immediately finding myself captivated by her voice, her inflections and her style of writing.
Her fifth album, ‘Hounds of Love’ introduced ‘Cloudbusting’. The song begins with someone awaking from dream, alone and crying. It borrows ideas from Peter Reich’s ‘A Book of Dreams’, a story about a son’s relationship with his father and a fantastic machine that can make it rain; together they go cloudbusting.
In August of 1990, I lived in a small flat in Miami Beach, Florida. I was conveniently located between my two favorite places; Flamingo Park and Grillfish (restaurant). A dog is a wonderful tool for dinner invites, and with excellent food being only five blocks away with a patio... ba-da-bing!
Rooby (my dog) and I had spent the better part of Sunday out and about. It was a day of wander-meant as I would often say; secretly imagining that Rooby was psychically tuned into my wry humor and was chuckling on the inside. We were at South Pointe Park when the rain set upon us and about twenty blocks later, we were home.
Drenched from head to toe, I tired to get a towel to dry Rooby before the inside of the house became drenched... yeah, I didn’t make it. After cleaning and drying, Rooby was fast asleep in her ‘Tuesday’ bed. I plopped down in my papasan chair next to her and caught up on a much needed nap.
My first experience with cloudbusting, sometimes referred to as ‘Fog’, was to be August 27, 1990. I only remember this date because Stevie Ray Vaughan died the following day in a helicopter crash.
Rooby began to bark. My eyes opened slowly at first, but were soon wide with curiosity and shock. There before me was a cloud; a writhing, pulsating, thick bodiless mass that in the purest sense of the word, freaked me out. Logic was desperately in search of an answer as to condition a proper response and in the confusion, I simply did not move.
This was not the case for Rooby; she turned barking up to eleven and began darting too and fro trying to herd away the ominous mass. The cloud began to expand rather quickly in a vertical plane and as it did, a black hole, void of existence, appeared in the center. The cloud expanded until it was the height of the room and about an arms span in width.
There was no sound. Fear lent to curiosity as I arose and peered into the space that wasn’t there. Rooby became silent at my side as we both just stood, dumbfounded. Then the face appeared. An unfocused apparition resembling the bust of a man slowly materialized, as though I were looking into the reflection of my unknown self.
As the image grew into focus, I recognized who this was. Heaviness seeped into my heart, a weight of loss and grief, augmented by a sort of happiness. It was my grandfather. He looked upon me, as if to measure the accomplishments in my life. I had often thought of him and missed him dearly.
I reached toward the image. I wanted to know if this was a dream. As my fingers began to breach the boarders of the cloud, a rush of horizontal slats, almost like a white picket fence suddenly appeared, moving violently upward and created a deafening sound. The ‘thump-thump-thump’ echoed into my soul.
I diverted my attention back to the image of my grandfather, now on the other side of the slats. His face was illuminated by an eerie, greenish glow. Another face, sinister and foreboding, began to morph from that of my grandfathers. I felt a sharp pain in my chest and was thrown backward into the papasan chair. Rooby’s barking was all I herd as I slipped into unconsciousness.
I awoke sometime later, still in the chair, the cloud had gone. Much to my dismay, I spent the next few weeks searching for Rooby, she had disappeared. I never found her.
I would like to say that I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now, for it is a clouds illusion I recall. As my first encounter, it would not be my last, and though my experience with clouds would later in life be extensive, I really don’t know clouds at all.
Her fifth album, ‘Hounds of Love’ introduced ‘Cloudbusting’. The song begins with someone awaking from dream, alone and crying. It borrows ideas from Peter Reich’s ‘A Book of Dreams’, a story about a son’s relationship with his father and a fantastic machine that can make it rain; together they go cloudbusting.
In August of 1990, I lived in a small flat in Miami Beach, Florida. I was conveniently located between my two favorite places; Flamingo Park and Grillfish (restaurant). A dog is a wonderful tool for dinner invites, and with excellent food being only five blocks away with a patio... ba-da-bing!
Rooby (my dog) and I had spent the better part of Sunday out and about. It was a day of wander-meant as I would often say; secretly imagining that Rooby was psychically tuned into my wry humor and was chuckling on the inside. We were at South Pointe Park when the rain set upon us and about twenty blocks later, we were home.
Drenched from head to toe, I tired to get a towel to dry Rooby before the inside of the house became drenched... yeah, I didn’t make it. After cleaning and drying, Rooby was fast asleep in her ‘Tuesday’ bed. I plopped down in my papasan chair next to her and caught up on a much needed nap.
My first experience with cloudbusting, sometimes referred to as ‘Fog’, was to be August 27, 1990. I only remember this date because Stevie Ray Vaughan died the following day in a helicopter crash.
Rooby began to bark. My eyes opened slowly at first, but were soon wide with curiosity and shock. There before me was a cloud; a writhing, pulsating, thick bodiless mass that in the purest sense of the word, freaked me out. Logic was desperately in search of an answer as to condition a proper response and in the confusion, I simply did not move.
This was not the case for Rooby; she turned barking up to eleven and began darting too and fro trying to herd away the ominous mass. The cloud began to expand rather quickly in a vertical plane and as it did, a black hole, void of existence, appeared in the center. The cloud expanded until it was the height of the room and about an arms span in width.
There was no sound. Fear lent to curiosity as I arose and peered into the space that wasn’t there. Rooby became silent at my side as we both just stood, dumbfounded. Then the face appeared. An unfocused apparition resembling the bust of a man slowly materialized, as though I were looking into the reflection of my unknown self.
As the image grew into focus, I recognized who this was. Heaviness seeped into my heart, a weight of loss and grief, augmented by a sort of happiness. It was my grandfather. He looked upon me, as if to measure the accomplishments in my life. I had often thought of him and missed him dearly.
I reached toward the image. I wanted to know if this was a dream. As my fingers began to breach the boarders of the cloud, a rush of horizontal slats, almost like a white picket fence suddenly appeared, moving violently upward and created a deafening sound. The ‘thump-thump-thump’ echoed into my soul.
I diverted my attention back to the image of my grandfather, now on the other side of the slats. His face was illuminated by an eerie, greenish glow. Another face, sinister and foreboding, began to morph from that of my grandfathers. I felt a sharp pain in my chest and was thrown backward into the papasan chair. Rooby’s barking was all I herd as I slipped into unconsciousness.
I awoke sometime later, still in the chair, the cloud had gone. Much to my dismay, I spent the next few weeks searching for Rooby, she had disappeared. I never found her.
I would like to say that I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now, for it is a clouds illusion I recall. As my first encounter, it would not be my last, and though my experience with clouds would later in life be extensive, I really don’t know clouds at all.
posted by Harmon J. Sedgwick at
1:41 PM
|
0
comments
