November Gratitude–For Rain

Apples in the Rain by Trudy Wilkerson

I’m hankering for thankfulness during this quiet dark month.

The rains have started in earnest, and for that I’m grateful.  It is time to hunker down and let the earth rest and replenish without feeling the need to plant, plow, weed or harvest.

Or maybe it is really us that need to be rested and replenished.

There is no better place to start than with gratitude.

For Less of Too Much

Hoh Rain Forest

Several weeks of spring rains have produced rain forest-like conditions in our region.  I am a Washingtonian born to rain, so being wet doesn’t intimidate me: I never use an umbrella,  I know what it is like to be soaked by “horizontal rain”,  I’ve learned to appreciate the refreshing renewal of constant drizzle.  This is a land of forty different words for rain (i.e. downpour, shower, trickle, precipitation, deluge, etc.), like the Eskimos have different words for snow.  In the fall and winter, rain is just part of the gray milieu, creating a dreariness that fits the downcast mood and the diminishing energy I feel.

But in the late spring, the rains just result in… excess.  Too much grass, too much moss, too much green, too much constant dripping…everywhere.  The growth it stimulates is overwhelming to the senses.  It no longer is the mildewy old smell of fall and winter rains.  It is a fill-up-your-nose verdurous scent that is reminiscent of the tropics of central Africa, without the “cut the air before you breathe” humidity.

It is simply too much for the senses to manage– so I dream of less.

But I’ll be hankering for it again come August…