Playing in the Rain

There are moments in life that feel like pure bliss. The other moments, the ones where the dishes are piled high in the sink, the laundry is unfolded, and the juice is spilled...those moments can wear me down. And then lately I look out our living room windows and in the big Texas sky I can see a storm rolling in. The winds change and the air smells fresh. I kind of want my girls to have a certain memory of me when they are grown up. I want them to say, "My mom would often be in her pajamas painting with us or in the midst of cleaning, and then she would see a storm roll in. Everything would change. She would open the doors and windows and exclaim that I storm was coming."

I hope that they remember this, because this is what I do. Maybe it is our little patio that is covered and that we are on second floor. There isn't much of a few but it doesn't matter. The rain is enough. It is so cooling. I try and hold our watering cans out to catch the rain and give the plants a drink. I say, "Blanche its raining! Its raining." So much of the time she replies, "Let me get my boots!" I have to explain that we can't really take Rosemary out in the rain. But one day, Andrew was home and I was able to say yes. I love saying yes.

Blanche and I were still in our pajamas, Rosemary was napping, and our morning hike with friends had been canceled. I told Andrew I was going to go collect rain water for the garden. Blanche said she wanted to come. Sometimes there is this look in her eyes that I can't say no to. Like when she wanted the ugliest little dog purse at target one time. There was just this look of wonder. I couldn't quench it. So I let her carry up to the check out and Andrew had to say no. But I could say yes to the rain. Even if it was literally pouring buckets. And it was pure bliss. The rain was cold and Blanche sprinted up and down the sidewalk. She laid in the puddles.

A long time ago in high school I wrote a really weird story about a girl who loved puddles so much that she would lay in them. It was in this stage of life where I literally wrote all the time. So I just wrote it because the image was in my head of this girl laying in a puddle. And then, that morning Blanche and I were in the rain, I told her we had to go back inside because the lightening was getting worse. And then Blanche just laid in the puddle. With her whole little body and all that she was. Those are the moments I know I am suppose to be a mother.