Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2001-11-12 - 10:50 a.m.

When It Rains

I have a windchime outside my bedroom. It's a bamboo one, with a lovely deep sound like jungle drums, almost the tock-sound of wood, almost the gong-sound of metal. Something in between. These chimes always stir restlessly before the rain. Last night I heard them begin murmuring, and I knew. This morning it's pouring.

Heavy rain days should be holidays. At least the first of the season. "National Wiper Day." The auto parts stores should all be open, though.

The woman from the insurance agency is coming today to appraise damage to my car. The rain is a problem, because I will probably have to ask her in. I don't want strangers in my house today. Some days are okay stranger days, but not today. I'm not actually sure when Stranger Days are, because I can't find my calendar in the mess on my desk.

Now the girls are playing half-in, half out of the house. I know they're tracking water into the entry way and making more mess, but I can remember the daring fun of playing in the rain and I'm not going to stop them. They've taken the umbrellas from the entryway, but they won't use them to keep dry. I'm not sure why they need to have them, but I know umbrellas are irresistible to kids. I do remember that if the puddles get deep enough, you can float them upside down like boats. (Umbrellas, not kids.)

On the weekend, BF and I sat in a hot tub in the gentle coastal rain. It was the adult version of umbrellas and puddles. There was something wonderful about the contrast of hot bubbling water and fine chilly drizzle. It was nice to enjoy rain again, instead of battling it with hoods and umbrellas and hurrying from door to door. So much of the time I seem to be fighting one thing or another.

I go barefoot a lot in the rain, or I wear my rubber gardening Birkenstocks. I get odd looks, but it just makes good sense to me. It's not like it's that cold here, and feet dry so much faster than socks or shoes.

My kids have never had raincoats. Won't wear them. I guess I didn't force the issue because I remembered the yellow coats with the spaceman hoods and the big odd metal clasps and the galoshes, and how much we hated them. Of course, we walked to school, and my kids don't. But I did want one of those little "purse raincoats", the clear plastic ones that come in the little tiny snap envelopes. Once you took them out, you could never never get them back in there. They were a one-shot deal. That's what the grown-up ladies had, complete with the little saran-wrap scarf to go over their coiffures. Made about as much sense as dressing kids up like something off the fish-stick box.

I like most of the sounds of rain. I like my chimes, and I like waking up in the middle of the night hearing it pour and being under four quilts and knowing I don't have to get up. I like the sound of the rain gurgling out of the downspout. I'm not crazy about the sound it makes when it pours over the top of the gutter at the low spot right outside my bedroom, but that comes later, in February. When the birch tree has finished refilling the gutters with trash, and the rain has turned colder, and I've been rethinking my decision not to buy more wood this winter. That's when I'll be fighting rain again, up on the ladder dredging crap out of the gutter and wishing I had a yellow sou'wester with a spaceman hat. But I'll still be barefoot.

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