Rainbow in a Bottle

"Did you know," she says "that when you see a double rainbow, the colors mirror each other?"

"Really?" I say with genuine interest, because no, I didn't know.

"Yes," she says as we both peer out the windshield at the blackening sky stretching before us, squinting as the sun burns into the side mirrors of the car. "I learned that in my weather class."

I drive on, both hands gripping the unfamiliar steering wheel and her feet curled up underneath her in the worn leather of the passenger seat that knows her well. Mist kicks up from the tires and for a moment, I concentrate on my speed and the way the tires feel beneath me; making sure I have control.

"Look!" she gasps and points ahead of us at the sudden apparition of two brilliant arches of mirrored color stretching across the pavement ahead of us; a welcoming gate into a perfect storm. The sun flares behind us as we climb a hill and we both stare in silence at the bold colors that seem to be breathing in the sky. It's one of those moments, I realize, that we'll never adequately be able to capture in film or even explain in a story. It's a moment that is taken in the most extreme raw format, corked up in some hazy blue-stained bottle and saved for a winter day when all is white and cold. And I think about all those bottles I have stashed away just for me, the glass stained with different colors of the seasons and the corks worn from being unstopped often; and I wonder if I'll ever be able to find a way to document my collection of priceless moments. Maybe they will be buried with me when my time comes, and as she wrote some time ago, whispered into the dirt and back into the atmosphere to become part of someone else's collection. I like that thought, I think. It is a little morbid, but it's something to hold on to when the despair hits as I realize I'll never be able to find the words or music or any concrete, tangible way to share those ten minutes we were hit by the most glorious rainbow I've ever seen. But maybe those thoughts will seep into the rocks and roots someday and be breathed back into the air, for after all, I am just a small part of something so much bigger. I am insignificant but count for something anyway. It is all part of the plan. I have a part in the plan. And my rainbow in a bottle is part of my plan.