It’s been a very long time since I just sat and watched it rain. I do other things for ‘self-care’. I don’t remember when the last time was that I simply sat and watched it ‘weather’. It’s been a long time since I watched rain turn earth into a mirror, ground reflecting everything above it – trees and bushes and houses and birds and clouds.
The reason I was watching rain today was because of the close proximity of a 9 month old, breathing in my ear, but hardly moving otherwise. A little face planted against the window, balancing herself on two shaky legs, watching water drop. Isn’t that amazing? Water drops! Right out of the sky! On one level I completely understand what’s going on. At another level it makes no sense at all! It is actually rather hilarious.
A squirrel was eating supper … that’s what I thought as I watched the little critter negotiate some acorns. Then it occurred to me – What makes me think it is supper? It was late in the day and I was thinking about supper, but watching water fall from the sky has a way of rendering the human penchant for marking time irrelevant. Do squirrels eat supper, or do they just eat when it seems right to eat? She pointed to the animal and made an “Oooo” sound. She watched it with her eyes, and then went back to watching it rain again.
My pulse calmed and my breathing quieted and I felt a sense of baptismal peace. Water was falling from the sky. “Some day,” I told her, “maybe your mom and dad will let you go outside and play in the rain.” Maybe not, what with ticks and Lyme’s Disease and water that has inadvertently been used to cool renegade radiation from some far-away place…
It fell quietly today and I watched it. How long before I do that again…
“As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth; it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”
I want to do more rain-watching…
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