The Tempest: One Year Later

This week was the one-year anniversary of *the* week.

On Monday, my brother was quoted in an Omaha World-Herald article about the tornadoes that hit Millard last June, causing $17,000 worth of damages to his home.

On Wednesday, I came home to be with my mom as she recovered from back surgery, just as I had come home to be with Emily and her family after her surgery last year. The following day, that beautiful young woman (who is only inches away from surpassing me in height) nudged my shoulder and said, "Yesterday was my anniversary." I smiled at her and thought, "I know, and I'm so proud."

Her brothers and I talked about the night we watched a second storm roll in together, and how they slept on the cement floor of Grandma's rec room while my parents and I watched in horror as the reporters said that four young boys had been killed when a tornado touched down at the Little Sioux Boy Scout camp, a camp my father and brothers knew well.

And then there was Thursday and Friday, when I sat in Emily's hospital room, glued to my laptop, combing the KCRG, Gazette, and Press-Citizen Web sites, and breathing out, "Oh my God" at regular intervals. Yesterday I drove home on a Saturday afternoon and thought of that Saturday a year earlier when I heard the boat tour of the Czech Village on the radio and first began to realize the severity of the situation.

Last night, Ben and I watched the KCRG special on the flood, Epic Surge (such a terrible title, but I want to buy it just for the clip when Bruce Aune gestures to Beth Malicki and says, "We've been going steady for 3 days now. I mean, *we* haven't been going steady. We're not dating" and for the shot of our friend Scott walking to the edge of the flood waters like, "Let me just take care of this thing...") Again, we saw that footage of the Czech Village, the footage of Palo, the footage of downtown Cedar Rapids, the footage of Coralville, the footage of the University, and I again watched in disbelief, still not sure that it happened.

The World-Herald article referred to the storm that hit my brother's house as a tempest, a bit over-dramatic perhaps, but as I am a person living with Shakespeare's Tempest, it made me smile. Earlier this week, I completed a fellowship application in which I detailed my experience teaching during the floods and the lasting impact those June days had on my teaching and my research. Even if I don't win the award, I loved writing that letter because I realized how that week led to a chain of events which continues to transform me and my work. The reasons I chose The Tempest as the focus of my dissertation have nothing to do with the stormy summer of 2008, but it is still so appropriate that I choose to write about these characters in the aftermath of a traumatic event, even as very real people around me grieve, rage against, and overcome their own experiences. More than anything, I have been encouraged over this past year as I have watched individuals slowly and surely rebuild their lives - my brother put his house back together one contractor at a time, Emily, and later Kaya and my Mom, heal their bodies one day at a time, and the people of Eastern Iowa reconstruct their communities piece by piece.

Giles Block, who directed a 2006 production of The Tempest at the American Shakespeare Center, wrote in his director's note that for him, " [ . . . ] The Tempest is filled by a sense of the new, which touches almost every scene.” Certainly, everything about this year of aftermaths has been new and unpredictable for us all. But I also like to think that with this newness comes growth. During the course of Shakespeare's play, Miranda grows from a child into a wife, Ferdinand (if only temporarily) grows into his role as a new king of Milan, Caliban's anger is transformed when he says, "I'll be wise hereafter / And seek for grace," and Prospero, too, learns to transform his revenge, saying, "Yet with my nobler reason 'gaist my fury / Do I take part. The rarer action is / In virtue than vengeance." Like these characters, we have all learned lessons this year. We have all grown and have seen how virtue can blossom in the midst of anger, sadness, and frustration. And even though we have emerged out of this year more weary and wary, we have also become more beautiful, grateful, and compassionate people for it.

After my prospectus meeting, I bought myself a Kathy Bransfield necklace that I wear daily. It is inscribe with the message: "The most beautiful stones have been washed by the waters and polished to brilliance by life's strongest storms." It's constant reminder to me that in the midst of great turmoil, the great beauty of humanity can emerge. It makes me want to exclaim, with Miranda, "How beauteous mankind is!" For both Miranda and I have cried, "O, I have suffered / With those that I saw suffer," but we both have also seen, and have embraced with joy, the possibilities of recovery.

John William Waterhouse, The Tempest

This week also marks the first anniversary of this blog. So I feel I need to say thank you for letting me ramble on about our lives, the dog, and the world. It means so much that you read in spite of the silliness of it all.