Some of us truly love the rain. We therefore get carried away when spring approaches and the snow becomes water again. I am arrogantly ignorant of the notion of unpleasant rainy days. But I do understand how something so beautiful can be rather daunting. We do not all experience things the same. This is why certain people cannot stand the rain and others ran into it. It is really a blessing to get free drinkable (unless the place is polluted) water straight from the skies. As a child, water shortages were the norm for my little village and for this reason we sung hymns of glee when the rain came. This experience is probably the foundation to my partiality for the wet ceremony. Rain meant one did not have to walk miles to fetch water. We had these aluminum gullies attached to the roofs in the courtyard of our house and put barrels and pots under them to collect water. And as we went about the happy chore of collecting free delivered water, we would play and bathe in the rain. The best kind of washing is the sort in which one sponges oneself in a roofless bathroom under a generous shower, straight from the heavens. When indoors, the pitter-patter of drops on rooftops and leaves and window panes and people’s umbrellas is one of the most beautiful songs in nature. It is so sooting it often puts one to sleep. But just lying there, listening, makes one feels a part of things. It is like a chant that something in the being understands and cherishes. And the fact that you have somewhere warm and dry to stay put while the wet stomps about outdoors pulls you under the charms of luck. But not all rainfalls are the same, one of my favorites is the surprise of soft showers on sunny afternoons. For the lack of something better to name it let’s call it magic. The sun shines like melted gold and the softest drops drizzle and dazzle in sparkles. If you have no umbrella the drops that choose to rest on your eyelashes create uncountable rainbows that transforms the view of your environs into something wonderfully unrecognizable: it is like you need only squint to fall into a fantastic dream world. You probably appreciate the fine job the rain does with the pavements and how it sucks the stink out of the air, filling it with sweetness. And if you love reflections, you appreciate how your shadow changes place with a blurry reflection which follows you in a glassy haze about town. It’s also quite lovely to look down to watch the skyscrapers and the clouds move in the puddles on the pavements, reminding you that it is indeed an ocean above. If you appreciate a good play of light, you get to relish the raindrops transform car lights and streetlights into soft brilliant smudges unlike a living painting. You enjoy the wet vivid contrasts, especially in the night when the lights bounce in the dark and reflects everywhere. If you are blind like me, all you need do is take your glasses off and the warm lights lose their sharpness and become numerous beacons of soft glowing stars floating everywhere and attaching themselves to everything, including you; making things lose their boundaries, flow into one another and become one. And on your little walks for feigned chores, if you are crazy enough, you go on and make those tiny jumps in the puddles you find waiting for you on the sidewalks. This is what rain boots are made for. But if you are like me and too chicken to splash when others are around, just walk quietly through the pools and allow yourself to go wild by splashing as hard as ‘your adulthood’ can manage when you are lucky enough to find yourself a delectable secluded puddle!
Happy leap day,
Jane
