Rain

Written on January 27, 2008

Rain

In New England, in the Berkshires, when it rains it rains. There is not any middle ground. Either it is dry. Or it is coming down. And you know it.

In the Northwest it is not so. There are two differnt kinds of rain out here. There is a soft rain and a hard rain. There is a dry rain and a wet rain. Neither of the two resemble the rain, the hard down pours, that I have always known.

It is a different experience that you have with the rain out here. It is a different relationship. The rain (in the winter) is constant. Sometimes it is a hard rain. Sometimes it is a soft rain. Sometime the rain hides for a while. Sometimes it even hides for a whole day. But it is always there. It's in the back of your mind. It is present in the sky, in clouds. You can smell it.

I remember winters in New England have no smell. Everything is sterile. Everything is impossibly frozen. Everything is crisp and harsh and brutal. Everything is sterile.

Out here the winter is full of smells. There is a constant dankness to everything. You can always smell moss, or trees, or bushes, but mostly moss if you take the time. The cold here, and it is cold here, is a numb nipping that raps on you slowly. It does not try to knock you out. In fact, you can forget about it with little effort. But it is there. And it does let you know it every once in a while.

I rember that in New England in the winters your world consists of paths. There is one path that you take from your house to your car. There is one path that you take from you car to work or school. You don't deviate from that path. That path that is no wider than the width of a shovel is your world.

In the Northwest winter you are constantly prepared for the rain. When you leave the house to a beautiful sunny day you still know that it is the rainy season. And you know that, more likely than not, the rain will return. Soon.

It is not an event when it rains. One does not say 'oh, my! it is raining'. The rain does not beat you into submission. The rain does not wow you. The rain just is. Sometimes it is soft. And sometimes it is hard.