Rain Again
"It is raining again, cheri. The elephants are restless."
I think I'm mixing Green Card and Amélie there. The quote always comes out of me in Gérard Depardieu's voice and this time it seems like there are too many words. But it is raining again and the elephants are restless.
The weather will burn off by this afternoon -- it always does and did yesterday -- but for the present, it is cool and grey and the sounds of traffic are all muted by the curtain of rain. I'm not one of those who dislikes the Pacific Northwest because of the rain; in fact, of the types of climates that I've lived in, it is the preferred environment. The weather here is mercurial -- quick and restless. The weather in Eugene, OR, is dismal and suicidal -- 2.2 days of sun throughout January -- and it is just grey, grey with a bit of mist in the air all the fucking time. Up north, the weather moves. Sure it rains and it probably rains as much as you think it does, but it doesn't stay. It comes, floods, and moves on. Even soft rain like what is brushing the leaves of the silver maple in the background right now won't last.
Weather like this forces a pause. You have to pull yourself out of the self-imposed busy work for a minute and listen.