Rains Have Different Personalities Too

Reciprocal Prompt for the last week of January

The Reciprocal prompt for this week is —

Rain sustains our lives

Rain, rain, go away…come again another day…

That’s what this current rain in north Texas has been like. When it’s been raining. The last two days have been so cold the rain has turned to sleet instead. And I am locked inside the house, camped out with a space heater by my feet keeping me toasty, writing this instead of traveling the slick, icy roads to meet a friend for lunch.

The winter rains I don’t like. The ones that roll in for several days and smother us in the dark, dreariness where I don’t see the sun’s shining face for days on end. This type of rain dampens my spirits, along with the earth that so vitally needs it’s sustaining moisture.

I don’t grumble about the rain (too much) because when it doesn’t rain, when the earth is parched and the cracks in the ground are several inches wide in places, then I’m not happy either. Along with others. We don’t like drought either. We don’t like the days of water rationing, saving bathwater in buckets to water our plants with, or the days of restricted water usage.

Ah, but send me a glorious thunderstorm and I’m over the moon with excitement.

The spring and fall storms that blow into the land with a fierceness and intensity, the skies rumbling and crackling, with bolts of lightening flashing through the air.

Now those storms I could have every day.

Maybe not. If they arrived every day, they’d probably be commonplace and then I’d start to take them for granted and they’d soon be just another blip on the scenery.

I blame my dad for my love of thunderstorms.

I was born and raised in a small town in southern California, Glendora, nestled at the base of the foothills. I remember my dad sitting outside enjoying God’s glorious display across the skies. And this fascination continues through another generation.

Between California and Texas, I lived in Arizona for one year. I was warned there about watching out for monsoon season, which usually started right after the Fourth of July. The warnings weren’t wrong. One day it was summer dessert weather. With a flash, the next day started monsoon season and oh, did I love every single day of it. The energy that fills the air with a thunderstorm is unlike any other energy.

I was working in an outdoor garden center and would be delighted as I watched the storms approaching from afar. Rolling closer, rumbling, and throwing spearheads as it came. Thunder booming across the parched land. Previously dry riverbeds in a jiffy so roaring with cascading water it wasn’t safe to cross.

Our property was across once such dry riverbed. You could hear the water coming before it arrived, rumbling down through the crevice of land it had carved out for itself through the years. I could stand outside and hear it coming, about five minutes before it got to where we lived.

More than once, I’d be coming home from work and would be stuck on one side of the riverbank, waiting for the water to subside. Often there were three or four groups on each side. It was like a party as we waited for the water to cascade by and for the riverbed to become passable again.

I soon learned to keep a few snacks and a water bottle in the car. Sometimes we’d be parked there for thirty minutes or so. I think at most an hour. Usually someone in the group would start marking the flood waters descent with a rock. Every five minutes or so we could see it receding lower and lower. Then finally, it was low enough we could pass without danger of being swept away, and we’d all wave goodbye to each other and go on our merry way. The party was over. Until the next time.

Every year there’s at least one or two deaths in the area, from people that don’t heed the warnings and thought they are invincible. They thought they knew better and could surely cross over this small little river that isn’t really all that bad. And they paid the highest toll for their crossing.

One thing I learned when I worked in the garden center that year, was that the rainwater was immensely better for the plants than our hand watering.

Why, I asked. I mean — water is water. Right?

Wrong.

My boss explained that the rainwater has nitrogen in it.

On Gardeningetc, they explain a little more:

Liam Lapping, a plant expert from Flowercard elaborates: ‘Rainwater is always best for your plants as it has a lower pH than hose water. It has more nitrates to help your plants grow and also has more oxygen to keep them happy and healthy.

Gardeningetc goes on to add:

Additionally, rainwater will typically be warmer than water from the hose, at least during the summer months. Liam explains that ‘plants do not like to be watered with overly hot or overly cold water, as this can shock their systems, they prefer being watered with tepid water at an ideal temperature between 62 to 72 degrees [Fahrenheit].’ By comparison, the typical temperature of hose water or cold tap water is 50–55 degrees Fahrenheit — way too cold for most plants.

Maybe my Grandma Cline had it right all those years ago. All the time she set out her buckets to collect rainwater for her indoor plants. Maybe she already knew that the water falling from the sky had more benefits than that which ran from her tap.

In the Reciprocal spirit, here are some stories I liked this week:

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