And I love the rain

 

                         

 June 7 • 2021

It's raining today and I can't stop smiling.

I took Chewy for a walk this morning in the spritzing rain. He pinned his ears back to keep the rain out but it wasn't raining hard so I don't know what he was playing at. It wasn't raining that hard, but I used an umbrella anyway - funny since I have a thing for getting soaked in the rain.

It's not quite the kind of rain that I remember when Claire was five. We lived in Pennsylvania. The sky had been dark and threatening, then it burst open, yes like a bucket had been tilted, and we tore outside in our bare feet and ran screaming around the big green grassy yard. Puddles forming in the dips in the grass, we jumped and crashed in the water, big trees all around, so much green.

It's not quite the kind of rain storm that hit in an earlier house in Pennsylvania, on another June day. Michael and I had our friend, Penny over to the house. Her beloved husband, David, had died the week before and there were no words to hold the grief we all felt. Especially for Penny. That summer evening the rain clouds moved in quickly. Thunder claps rattled the house. There was lightning. And then, the rain came down, yes, in sheets. And the three of us ran out the back door, yelling and screaming down the sloping back yard, tall pine trees swaying in the wind, rain soaking us through our clothes. 

Oh, so many rain stories:

• Out on the Sunfish with Dad in a scary rain storm in Little Neck Bay, me thinking we were going to die. Yes, a tad dramatic, but it was a helluva storm to be in a tiny sailboat. 

• Camping with Claire and my brother, Rob, in a torrential rain storm out in Montauk, tent walls crashing on us in the middle of the night. 

• With our friend, Bill Paden, at the Jazz Festival in Delaware Water Gap, the rain hit so fast and hard, our jeans were soaked as if we'd stepped out of a shower.

• Jesse with her red wagon and a big umbrella out on the sidewalk - a kind of rain fort

... + so many more

When it rains, I hurry to bring my inside plants, outside.

May it rain all week, easy and gently, so the parched earth out here in California can lap it up.

It's June, and not April, but I love this poem and today made me think of it.

🐟

April Rain

Let the rain kiss you

Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid

drops

Let the rain sing you a lullaby

The rain makes still pools on the sidewalk

The rain makes running pools in the gutter

The rain plays a little sleep song on our roof at night

And I love the rain.

- Langston Hughes

XO B 

I'll Start With Bear

 

                     June 1 • 2021

I'll start with the Bear.

Bear came walking out of the woods just as my brother Rob turned off the highway onto a country road in Pennsylvania. I've always loved bears. A favorite memory is seeing one in our back yard (we lived on two acres in Pennsylvania) scratching on the maple tree. As soon as my daughters spotted it, I flew outside in my bare feet and followed it from a good distance. It meandered through the yard, the tall trees, across the road into a more wooded place. My daughters thought I'd lost my mind. I needed the bear vibe.

Living in in Southern California, we don't have bears walking through the tiny back yard. But there's all kinds of other wildlife. At the ocean, whales, dolphins, seals. Out my desk window: lizards, birds, rabbits, squirrels, hawks, hummingbirds, chihuahaus in colorful vests,

 + the coyotes wandering the neighborhood at night. 

I saw one recently while walking Chewy, the big-eared dog around nine at night. They often travel in packs, but this one was standing under the street light. Seemingly alone.  Once Chewy got a sniff/look of Coyote, he started barking. Coyote stared, then took off. 

                  this is not a coyote

Today I went to my beloved library, recently opened after fourteen months with its doors shut. My return a few weeks ago to shelves of books is another conversation. But today's magic was when I saw Turtle staring at the wall outside the doors. Totally get that, Turtle. Later as I was leaving, Turtle was quietly on its way back to the pond where all the other turtles hang out. 

There's the May story about the mourning doves who built a nest on my friend's garage light. How Pink (that's the dove's name) sat and sat until two hungry chicks hatched. How I came to my desk every morning and watched her. 

sit.

See Pink (during her first nest-in) behind this napping squirrel? 

Mary Oliver wrote in her poem, When Death Comes:

"When it's over, I want to say: all my life

I was a bride married to amazement.

I was the bridegroom, taking the world in my arms." 

            the babies

        xo b 🐝