The Old Man Is Snoring

It’s raining. It’s pouring, with no let-up. It’s teeming, the authors would say. Why “teeming?” Why that particular word, used mainly for rain and insects and crowded sidewalks? I think it is an attempt to quickly convey the feeling of the “aliveness” of heavy rains.

The skies are overcast. There is a pressure from them that seems to flatten us into the earth. Even the air---before the rain owns it---is thick, harder to push your way through. On a normal day we’re entirely unaware that air has substance. Let a storm threaten and we realize its weight. It becomes tangible, something we can almost hold in our hands. The day scrapes at our emotions like an invisible, lurking predator. And we begin to act like prey. We look up at the sky more often. We scurry more rapidly through our outdoor tasks. I suspect scientists would be able to measure an increase in pulse and blood pressure, as we begin to respond to some inner urge to prepare. No conscious thought of what we’re preparing for, just the unconscious urge to be more alert, and hurry.

Then, with a clap of thunder---or a pause in time, sound and motion suspended for a fraction of a second---the rains come. And if it’s a hard rain, it teems. It repels us, propels us into shelter. And we all do the the same thing: We stand there as if hypnotized---for a moment, or for minutes, we simply stare. We take in the speed of the transformation. We watch the rain falling through the air, watch it hitting the ground, and draw the scent of it into our noses.

Gone is the pressure, the lurking threat, the need to prepare. Now we wait. Wait for permission to take back our day for our own desires. But right now, while the rain washes away the oppression with the dust, and races downhill as if keeping an appointment with the ocean---right now we peer out at it, and are as rapt in watching as the youngest child. It Is Alive! Pour water from a bucket and dead water flows out to fall dead at our feet. Rain does not fall; it runs and dances and whirls. It slants in like a base-runner evading the ball. It throws itself at windows, and feels for a gap to gain entrance. It tap dances on the leaves, setting up a multitude of counter beats to perform to. It joins the collected puddle of its fellow parachutists, but not quietly. It slams into them, knocking some back into the air. It plops in with a sort of glee. It tries to make belly-flop sprays that will reach the edge of the puddle.

Rain is alive. We know that on some level. And while it’s coming down, we watch like animals in our cages, while this free creature cavorts, celebrates, and claims its dominion---while it teems through the air, through the streets, along the gutters, and over the rooftops.