Waxing Gibbous by Liz Flaherty

It was a dark and stormy night...no, really, it was. I thought I saw the moon hanging clear and pale orange this morning, but when I went to take a picture of it, I can't find it. I don't know how you lose the moon, but I appear to have done so. Thinking I had imagined it, I looked up the moon's phase today and found this: 

"Today, the moon phase is Waxing Gibbous, with an illumination of 79.37%. It is currently 10.33 days old on Saturday, April 1, 2023. The moon is currently located in the constellation of ♌ Leo."

I still can't find it, but I did learn the term waxing gibbous. Since I am a Leo, and the moon is currently located in my constellation, it was, of all things, a comforting thing to find on this dark morning after the stormy night. Finding new words is one of the most satisfying parts of being a writer, especially when you like how it looks in print--as is the case with waxing gibbous.

Another favorite word and one I don't often use, is ephemeral. So many things match its definition, which is "lasting for a very short time." Like my sighting of the moon in its waxing gibbous stage. Like the astonishingly beautiful rainbow earlier this week. Like the years between your child's birth and his or her eighteenth birthday. Like the feeling at the end of a very good day of can it always be like this?

No. of course it can't.

I wrote earlier this week about what five minutes can mean. The article came on the heels of heartbreak after the shooting in Nashville, Tennessee, where people died. Where children died.

What I am reminded of, thinking of five minuteses and the words ephemeral and waxing gibbous is that there are things that don't fit into those quick parameters. Things like loss and the lives and homes that will never be the same again. Things like heartbreak. Those things scar over, leaving emotional knots and lesions in their wake, but they don't ever go away.

I don't have an end to this, nor have I found the moon I saw for just a few seconds in the early morning. The sun is coming up now, pushing color into the slate-colored clouds that hang above the horizon. I hope it will be a good day. I hope you have a good week.

Be nice to somebody.