Rain is very innocuous; it is water that falls from the sky onto the planet. It has been an essential part of every human culture that has ever existed, and remains a vital part in our lives today. It brings life to everything around us. The Navajo used to rejoice at the sight of the rain, and go out into it. Yet, we are saddened when we wake upon a rainy day. We cringe and run for cover at first sign of those drops on our skin.

Why do we act this way? It is a sign of what we have come to value in society. Some of us cringe and run for cover because we want to protect the array of electronic equipment we carry. Other’s cringe to protect their vanity; be it make-up, hair, or clothing. I am not, as many others are, against these two reasons. I have no problem with people who wish to protect their investments in communications, and image; it is all perfectly reasonable.

The problem that I do see though is our inability to let go. Even when we have our equipment firmly secured in our waterproof bags, and we are not dressed to kill; still even then we cringe because we cannot let go, we do not relax. In a world of increasing complexity and ever more demanding responsibilities, we must learn to relax.

Ask yourself when you see the rain coming down; do I have to run this time? Is it really going to hurt my clothes to get wet on a spring or summer day? If not, take the time to let go. Learning to walk in the rain and coming to accept being wet, takes time. The whole point of rain walking is releasing the habit of cringing, of realizing that you are safe in the rain, and that it is not your enemy. It is a practice of active awareness, of brining yourself to break with ingrained reactions, of knowing if the reasons for your actions are founded or not.

Alright so I don't really care about the atheist essay responces and I don't feel like writing it. I tried, but I got bored. So I am sure I will write on this topic again, and I am sure your responses will be almost identical so we'll wait till next time and I will just continue onwards.

~E.

Hello Everyone,

After some many weeks of not having a working computer I am now fully operational again. I am also fully wireless now thanks to (e:enknot) . My first order of business will be to read and respond to all of the comments that were left for me about my Atheist Life essay. I look forward to stiring the drama with you all.

~E.

Hi Everyone,

My computer has died. I will most likely be out of commission for a while until I can get another one.

Best Regards,

~Eric.

Authors Note: This is a breif fiction piece I worked up one day while listening to some music. Violin Music, but a pianist seemed better for the story. I hope you enjoy.

He was old, in the way trees are old, when he played the piano for the last time. A pianist for over seventy years, there was little doubt that he knew he was not long for this world. His life flew before him as he walked out from behind the heavy red curtains to thunderous applause. His mind drifted back to the first time he had heard that sound, he was 15 again, and it was 2020, the dawn of a golden age. The horrible wars had ended, and it seemed the whole world was finding new life.

It was the pain that brought him back. It reminded him that he was a long time from then, and much older. He didn't smile or wave at the audience as he approached the grand piano. He never did. The collar of his tuxedo was spiked, and he wore no tie. He never did. He was, as he always was, The Virtuoso. But now he had to shuffle slightly in his mirror black shoes. It was his posture that held the image intact. It always did.

He sighed to himself as he sat before his life long friend. The beauty, which had seen him through six discordant marriages, with which he could creature such harmony, that it brought tears to the eyes of marble statues. His hands moved across its varnish. Reflected in its gloss, he could see where his hair had receded to a collection of white wisps that he allowed to stick up in all manner of directions as tribute to his predecessors.

The sheet music that he had told them he would be playing sat in its stand before him. It was a piece he had composed many years ago to celebrate the rebirth of reason, the arrival of the second renaissance. He looked the sheets of music over now, paternally turning the pages to their intimately known ends. After viewing all the sheets, he took them and, with a flourish, made confetti of their contents. The audience gasped, but then went silent, watching. To him those notes were already dead, insufficiently composed for this event.

With this done, and before the last torn page of notes hit the floor, his hands were at work on the keys of the piano. The audience gasped again at the explosive triumph of this beginning. The notes were violent; yet they harmoniously spoke of life as no words could. Each passing moment was filled with expressions of his loves, his losses; his life's passions incarnate in music. The whole of it seemed to be building, reaching for a crescendo, but waiting just a moment longer to reach it because he was not ready yet.

He played for nearly an hour, pouring himself into the creation, and then, as the audience wept with the joy of the piece. It crescendos in a blaze; completing and joining all the themes into one final exhilarating, but absolute, end.

As the fingers of his right hand played the final notes in a hall of silence, his left slowly closed the fallboard over the keys. For a second or two there was no sound, a final rest in the music, and then the audience stood with tears in their eyes clapping in joy, and with enormous grief. For in that moment of final rest The Virtuoso had laid his head down across the fallboard concluding his life and work.