I’m a Saskatchewan boy. Living here off and on for 60 years means that I understand extremes. Extreme cold and heat, interspersed by mere hours, is always a great topic of conversation.
Recently I awoke to snow on our vehicles. Rain had fallen earlier, and mere days ago we were in the midst of summer weather well above normal.
The conversation around coffee tables and in grocery store lines was lined with comparisons of snowfall amounts and expressions of surprise.
Why do we always talk about the weather? Aren’t there more important topics?
My father was a weather forecaster. Back in the days when most of us lived by looking out the window and guessing. The general average was 80% correct forecasts from the government weather service.
80% is not bad. But the 20% was enough to generate hot air for days!
Now we watch radar as storms approach. We access sites that are accurate in their predictions. Sophistication has become the byword of weather prediction. Radio stations boast they have accu-weather abilities – and they put their money where their mouth is!
We know what’s coming. We can prepare for what is coming. We can get bored talking about the predictable.
Is the fun gone from our grocery store chats and our coffee row discussions about the weather?
Not in the least. We still talk about weather. As though we didn’t know what was on the way. Just for the fun of it!
But the weather was never about the weather, was it?
It was about conversation icebreakers and community and living together.
Maybe God knew we needed the sun to rise and set, the wind to blow and the rain to fall. We live in the same world and experience the same things. And we learn to “live together”, as my parents often remarked.
When you weather the weather together, somehow you are a part of the life of the person standing next to you. You are now able to step further into their life. Perhaps there is more that they are weathering. Their storms can become a part of your life, and perhaps you can provide a shelter for them.
The weather is a doorway to community.
So . . . “How’s the weather?”
