I Like This

I like this. There’s pounding rain outside. I can hear it drop. Large, heavy, uncaring globules of water. It’s night time. I was outside walking not seven minutes ago. The air was dry, warm and somewhat light. There were no dark, water-leaden clouds; or at least I think, from my half-attentive scattered mind’s image.

I like this. There was no sign. Or at least I’m half-sure there was no sign. You see, it hasn’t rained in a while. A looong while. Rain has become a mind’s image, from a time in the past when it frustrated us. One would wake up, draw the curtains and glaring at you from the other side would be gloom. Clouds the sight of a greying old man. A mist wafting among the still, sleeping cars. And there, you’d sigh, toss out the wardrobe choice you had in mind, and tiredly start trying to think of a non-sweat or non-water-soaked hoodie you may be in ownership of. Two hours later, when you are comfortably kilometers away from your wardrobe, the sun would peek; slowly, timidly at first, then all at once! Regaining its poise, it would shine on, no, ‘burn’ on, unflinching. And there you’d be, sweating in an already sweaty hoodie.

I like this. Even though it may find you walking in the night, the rain has now become sane. I wake up, draw the curtains, and there, falling diagonally, is sane rain. Or drunk rain? If I met a man, a large and heavy, possibly loud man, walking diagonally after ten o’clock, I’d think he was a drunk man. Sanity, though, is neither here nor there.

I like this. This drunk rain, it (read drums) sings me to sleep. Or is it the buckets that it falls on that sing me to sleep. It has tempo. It starts like drums fading in, rises, almost instantly, to a crescendo, just as a gust of wind does in the night. It then shifts between slow, heavy beats and momentary fast, light-on-the-bucket beats. I only hear two cycles of this before I plunge into the darkness behind my eyelids.

I like this. There’s zero of those cycles when I wake up. I draw the curtains and find the sun smiling, shining unflinchingly. I don’t have to rethink my wardrobe choice. Good, I don’t have to think.

I like this. Showering with luke-warm water at noon, the sun high in the sky. Finally, being able to muse under the shower, as the water cascades down my hair. No fast-paced gymnastics trying to evade colourless magma. This comfortable hum of actual warm water. Assured expectations of non-chocking or slightly coughing faucets. The silence, as my skin stops screaming.

I like this. This damp leaves I stand on. This warmth, the heavy, easy yet hard-to-breathe air.

I like this. Rain has fallen here.