Image: Google, labelled for re-use

No one realised at the time that it was the beginning of the Abundance.

The rain began and didn’t stop. Rivers rose, and people were evacuated and then rose further, and the evacuated became the evacuated again. Entire communities disappeared under the rising waters, and then the rain stopped.

The clean-up was long and arduous, but the sun shone, and everything dried up and after a time stopped smelling.

Someone calculated the rainfall to be of Old Testament proportions, and so the religious right had a field day explaining the significance of it all. In the meantime, the sun shone. It grew hotter with each passing day, and people sweltered under it.

The earth dried out and crops needed constant watering which drained the abundant water supply from the rainfall.

Then the wind began to blow and didn’t stop. So, strong was it the erosion it caused was beyond anyone’s memory. Whole farming communities were devastated and as time passed and the wind blew people began to call the phenomenon the Abundance.

It was if nature had forgotten how to regulate itself.

People feared as the winter drew near that there would continue to be extremes and they were right.

Within a week of the wind stopping the snow came and with it a cold like never before. The once flooded rivers froze, the ponds that provided life to the bird life did the same and all around the country looked a frozen wasteland.

Life was more and more difficult to sustain. Supermarkets ran out of fresh food; frozen goods were in short supply as the delivery chain had been severely disrupted by so many roads becoming impassable.

People learned how to ration. How to keep warm with limited heating. How to survive the Abundance.

Communities counted the days until the beginning of spring believing things would change and what else could nature throw at them.

So, spring arrived, and the earth warmed and the communities that survived rejoiced in the warmth of the sun as around them the ice and snow melted.

But this was short lived as the Abundance was not finished with them. The arrival of spring brought with it plagues of insects, and like the humans, the insects had hunkered down against the winter and found the spring an ideal time to spread forth their wings. And they did.

The insects brought with them disease, and many died.

Those who survived did so by adapting to the new environment. Believing the Abundance was now a part of their lives they discovered it was far easier to live with it rather than fight against it.

Change happened, and man evolved to deal with the Abundance.

Written for: https://sammiscribbles.wordpress.com/2017/09/09/weekend-writing-prompt-19-abundance/