It is no secret I do not like rain...which is akin to blasphemy in Southern California. I have my reasons. I grew up in Panama, where it rained all the fucking time...rainforest kind of rain. There was a rainy season where it rained at least twice a day and then a “dry” season where it only rained once a day. Fuck, it was a very, very wet place.
So my disdain for rain is long standing. I come by in honestly I am claiming. I love what the rain does but I don’t want to participate in life while it is doing its thing. I want to stay inside and pretend it isn’t happening.
Rain also brings up fear for me. I worry that there might be a leak in the roof, something might flood, a giant oak might come crashing through my living room window. Those kinds of things are ever present on my mind when it is raining. I don’t try to think these things, I just do...think them that is. So rain is anxiety provoking for me. I hate driving in it and am constantly worried that one of the SoCal drivers will lose it because they are so unfamiliar with the things you need to be careful about when it is raining and driving. So, again, I do not like rain.
But what I really don’t like about rain is that I cannot think about it differently - I mean to me, rain is snow’s failure. I love snow. I mean I don’t want to live in it, but I love it so much. There is such a romance to snow, where as rain feels like a breakup. Snow is magical and beautiful and uplifting whereas rain feels dreary, sad and heartbreaking. And in this life there is a time for all: the rain and the snow.
Having recently traveled to the snow, I have a renewed interest in it. I found that I miss it. The quietness it brings to the very loud world. The stopping of things, all the busyness and movement, snowing grants permission to be still. Sit in front of a fire and dream, cuddle and be present. Rain does not grant such permissions...the dogs are wet, a mess and messy. There are wet leaves everywhere. They find their way into my home and cause slippery issues on my floor. The goats hate the rain and are most unhappy. And that makes me sad because goats should never, ever be unhappy.
Rain also makes me feel disappointed, like snow could be here but rain showed up instead. I feel like you are waiting for Santa but you get some random elf instead. I mean the elf is fine and all but he isn’t fucking Santa. We all want Santa! Not a random elf!
So that is what rain is to me...snow’s failure. It could be snowing right now and to me that would make all this moisture better. I am not a huge fan of the melting and all the wetness that brings, but I would take that any day over the constant drizzle and attendant wetness that brings nothing of value to me. I know, I am the one that doesn’t value rain. Rain has lots of inherent value but to me it is just an inconvenient annoyance that makes me cranky and brings on the feeling that I want to hide.
What I have learned is that rain closes me down emotionally. Whereas snow opens me up. I have come to notice these things about my life: little things like weather that cut me open or seal me off. It is a practice that I do daily - watching what and who close me down or open me up. Snow is opening, rain is closing but I can learn equally from each experience...I just enjoy one way more than the other.
Today I will do my best not to be shitty about the rain. I have owned that I am not a fan and that I am not a good SoCal girl giving all the rain platitudes...generally speaking, I really wish it was snow...in fact, I am kind of sad that it isn’t...so I guess I am learning that snow’s absence kind of works like rain...it shuts me off too. And that is good information for someone who is trying to pay attention to this life as it comes at me. Seeing what I can learn, change and grow from. Today, it is apparently rain.
But it is also snow, because I know that when the clouds fade away, the mountains that surround my home will be covered in the fluffy white goodness that makes me so happy. And while their frosting will be distant, I can enjoy snow’s vista and be a little less irked by it sending rain as its proxy.
Regardless, rain will always be snow’s failure to me. And that is just going to have to be ok.
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