Trial: Enemies
“California Hills in August,” by Dana Gioia
Enemies
You knew this day would come the day you met enemies on the road of trials. But more than likely, the enemy you met is not the one you expected. Often an enemy was once a friend (or even closer).
For me, the enemy of enemies — rendered symbolically — is drought.
“California Hills in August” 
Drought is the natural disaster we don’t talk about … until it touches us. It’s silent and stealthy. It desiccates and destroys. One of the most devastating tragedies I’ve ever read is “The Time It Never Rained” by Elmer Kelton. It describes the enemy that undoes me.
It’s the phone that does not ring. The email or text with no response. The seemingly eternal question, How long?
At the end of 2021, the rain gauge showed we were down 5 inches, and oh how we wailed. Now we’re down 14 more inches, and we can’t even seem to muster tears. The enemy of drought rewires your brain. Even when rain finally comes, its long absence is unerasable. As a poet friend wrote, “Even as it rains, we pray for rain.”
All these years later.
Be a Hero
It can be an act of heroism to name an enemy as an enemy. One friend recently told me she has schizophrenia. Another said she was leaving an abusive husband. For me, it’s naming my drought to someone and having that friend quietly whisper, Me too.
Try to learn a little of this poem by heart.
What does it say about your hero’s journey?
If you like, email me at megan.willome@yahoo.com.
I loved this book. As soon as I finished, I began reading it again.”
—David Lee Garrison, author of Playing Bach in the D. C. Metro
