I am being driven slowly and inexorably insane...

...by the wind. The snow I can handle, snow is a Grace and I stand by my Graces. But the wind. The constant blowing howling screaming shaking-the-house-and-rattling-the-windows wind. It's become my new decorator: screen doors are blown open, deck furniture rearranged, the outdoor thermometer carried away, Christmas lights swinging madly, and beautifully lit topiaries on either side of the front door thrown down and blown across the front porch. And still it continues to blow. Could there be a downside to living on a mountain?, I used to wonder? Yes, my friends, the flipside to my gorgeous view is tremendous exposure and winds coming down the side of the mountain at a gale-force.

The problem is, I'm afraid of wind.

Crazy right? Well it all began 35 years ago... One of my most pronounced childhood memories is of huddling in the bathtub with my brother, pillows on our heads, breath held, waiting. Waiting. Waiting for the all-clear from my dad to come out as the twister passed overhead or on the next street or wherever it went. I remember the air earlier in the day: it was yellow. Can you see air? Well, I could and it was yellow and heavy and hard to breathe. I remember my mom yelling at me "Where are your shoes? I can't believe you can't find your shoes! We have a tornado coming and you're just going to have to put your sandals on and if your feet get all cut up then it's your own fault!" The next morning my beloved swing set was found in a neighbor's yard and stories of devastation were all over the news: homes gone, families killed, children missing. Good times, good times.

Fast forward 25 years and you have me with my 5 week old baby. Steve is out of town on business and my mother-in-law came to stay the night. There is a bad storm that night with high winds. Wee hours of early morning my father-in-law calls sounding slightly panicked "Are you all right?" "Yeah, Dad, why?" "There's been a tornado about a mile from your home, major damage!" Later that morning it's all over the news: apartment buildings sheered open as if with a giant can opener, cars thrown about, lives destroyed.

Fast forward to December 2008. A major ice storm hits the northeast. I awaken in the wee hours of the morning to what sounds like gun shots. I wake Steve and insist he come downstairs with me. The wind is howling, the storm is raging and the "gunshot" sounds are tree limbs breaking all around us. Our power is out for days and the damage to the area runs into the millions. 100-year-old trees are uprooted and one falls through our garage, just a few feet away from the room in which we'd been sleeping.

Wind. I have to find a way to feel sanguine about this force of nature or I'm not going to be getting a lot of sleep at night or peace during the day. "Why are you so crabby today?" My husband asks, and I don't know what to say. Do I tell him how on edge I feel? Do I yammer on about childhood traumas involving wind? Do I just suck it up and get over this fear?

I keep trying to provide myself a peace filled spiritual outlook on the wind: winds of change, out with the old, in with the new, I am like the willow I bend with the wind I do not break.

But the howling just creeps me out.