The intensity of the storm, its path, the drawn-out life of it, has worn everyone out.  It teased coastal residents county by county, slinking out of reach past Florida, then Georgia, South Carolina.

When Dorian finally makes landfall in Cape Hatteras, NC, it is a Category 1 of flooding pocked with tornadoes.  Damaging, true, but not like in the Bahamas, in the beginning, where it had the perfect conditions for epic rain and winds and force.  It had been a tight swirl of a rascal, hell-bent on lingering at the exact place it is least needed, but look at it now!

Weeks of worry for millions of people have once again ended, with sighs of relief for most.  Giddiness overtakes:  We escaped this time!  We hunkered down, and nothing happened!

It’s not a victory, though, of mind or will or intention. No one escapes a storm through wishes, prayers, or good behavior.   It is a chance thing, the whimsy of nature, a system of impacts on impacts leading to a final lucky outcome for those in the right place.

And escape is not even the ultimate goal, is it?  Because there is always another storm on the horizon, one which you may or may not have to endure.  One which might just find you, if not this time, then the next, or the time after that.  So the running or the hunkering down might be temporary fixes.  Not safety for the long-term.

Because there will be a storm you cannot outrun.  But one with which you can abide.