Rain

photo credit

Today is one of those days… the sky is grey and ominous… the threat of rain is imminent. And I absolutely love it.

Oh, don’t get me wrong – I don’t love driving in it because the slightest slickness on the roads makes everyone lose their minds, but I absolutely, unequivocally, without question love the rain.

Here in Central Texas, we try to not complain about rain… our lakes are in desperate need at only around 33% full… but my adoration of the wet falling stuff goes so much deeper…

There is a peace in the rain – even when the sky is full of anger…

The thunder and lightening storms are magical to watch – so much that on my commute up to Colorado this past summer I had to LITERALLY phone a friend to regale him with the amazing lightening show I was watching… lucky for me, he too is a fan… otherwise, that call would have just been weird.

I remember as a kid sitting out on our front porch… the same front porch I call home to this day in fact… and watching the storms with rapt attention.  I could sit for hours and watch weather happen.

There’s something refreshing about how green and fresh and new everything looks after a storm too.  Kind of like my kids after they’ve had a bath and washed all the “boy grossness” off.  Fresh… new… like a clean slate.

Water is rejuvenating and cleansing… I was thinking about a friend of mine who is new to the world of shared parenting and struggling with her kiddo making the transition between houses.  Silly as it may sound, we started years ago having the boys shower the minute we got home from dads and never really told them why… whether in our minds or not, it’s like a fresh start in that scenario too.  I do the same after a particularly hard day… sometimes you just have to wash the day off.

Maybe that’s why so many come up with their best ideas in the shower… it’s a chance to wash off old ideas and open yourself up to new ones.

Maybe it’s just me though – water baby from the word go, water is home… whether on a lake or at the ocean or in the middle of a thunderstorm watching as the rain falls down from the sky, washing away all the grime and feeding the flora and fauna and my soul…

I still haven’t found the one who wants to dance in the rain with me… not on a romantic level I mean… someday.  Someday my perfect match will show up and together we will watch storms from the porch and revel in the majesty of  weather… or will splash in puddles like two overgrown children… or just walk along hand in hand in no hurry to escape the downpour but enjoying every moment and maybe even stealing a kiss or two.

Yes… I still have overly romantic notions…

…but when you find the person that shares those ideas, they no longer become silly.  Instead, they just become part of your world and that is a world I want to live in.