The forecast says maybe rain today. I love it. You can’t be wrong when you say maybe. Right now, though, the clouds are few, and they don’t look like rain clouds. The sun keeps appearing and disappearing. It’s a chilly morning with a cool breeze.
Gracie and I were on the deck. The red spawn has started eating flowers from the clay pots. It had the nerve to grab a flower, scurry up a branch then sit and dine al fresco right in front of me. Now, though, I have the nozzle on the hose set to jet and I’m just waiting for the spawn.
When I was a kid, a rainy Saturday was the worst. If the rain was heavy, it meant staying inside all day, the most important day of the week for any self-respecting kid. On Saturday we had no obligations. We had no homework to finish, no church and no family dinner demanding our attendance. It was our day to do whatever we wanted except when it rained. A summer rain, though, was sometimes gentle, and we went out anyway. We figured the sun would appear and dry us. A winter rain made us chilled to the bones, and we didn’t whine about having to stay inside. On those Saturdays my dad would sometimes drive us to the matinee, more for his sake than ours. He wanted us out of the house. We were glad to oblige.
Even as a kid, I loved the sound of rain. On one vacation, in Maine, on a rainy day, I went to the car with my book, settled down in the back seat and read. The sound of the rain on the car roof was like music. The stronger the rain, the louder the music.
During the rainy season in Ghana, everywhere was music. The roof of my classroom was tin, and the sound of the rain hitting the roof was all we could hear. Teaching was impossible. My students would read, but each in turn seemed to stop, look above and listen. It didn’t matter how familiar we were with the sound; it still drew us.
The rain on thatch had a different sort of music, a crisper sound. My back courtyard was concrete, and the rain hit it with a pounding beat. The open sewers ran when it rained, and it was the sound a stream makes, a rippling sound, a burble.
On many a rainy day, I would sit on my front porch under the small tin overhang and listen. Even now I still remember the music.
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