Rainy Days and Memories

I'm not trying to cheat. This is a picture of Bridal Veil Falls, not rain.

I'm using it because I don't have a suitable photo of a rainy day.

There have been times in my life when rain ruined big plans, but for the most part I have positive associations with rainy days. When I was little, in Georgia's red clay country, a good rain meant you'd have puddles for wading or floating toy boats for several days. We had a large puddle beside the entrance to our driveway that rarely dried up before another rain came along to refill it. I got my first bicycle while living there, for my 6th or 7th birthday. Unfortunately, it rained for several days in succession, non-stop. My sympathetic and loving mother allowed me to ride my new red bike with training wheels inside the house! That was so sweet I never forgot it. Rainy days were also great for making indoor clubhouses using blankets, up-turned chairs, and card tables. We played games, read, and manufactured fun. We had a wonderful screen porch where we set up Fort Apache or World War II battlefields, played with our electric trains, or constructed with Lincoln Logs and domino towers.

When we moved a couple of miles away, we had a stream in our back yard. The house, where Mama and Daddy still live, was on the high ground above the stream and back yard, which was in a flood plain. When the days of rain came, we resorted to our old favorite indoor diversions, but would keep looking out the back windows to see if our stream had overflowed its banks yet. It took a lot of rain to accomplish this, but the raging torrents were a sign that with continued rain, our yard would eventually become a rice paddy. Even though we couldn't play there in those conditions, it never failed to take our breath away to see the Noah's Ark scenario unfolding.

During college years, all four of my summers were at Camp Cherokee near beautiful blue Lake Burton in north Georgia. It rained more there than anywhere I've resided before or since. In some ways, rainy days were harder work for the counselors because we had to use every ounce of ingenuity to entertain 50 active boys without letting anyone get bored. Instead of archery, riflery, skiing, and outdoor games, we substituted Hide Mr. Duck, Parson Parson, Community Sings, and impromptu dramatics down at the barn. Not that we had to stay indoors. We all went barefoot on rainy days (all pioneers know to keep their shoes dry!) and wore raincoats or ponchos. Many engaged in dam building as red clay rainwater gushed down gulleys and through ditches. Teams of muddy, happy campers used their hands, the abundant clay, large rocks, and camping shovels to try to control the roaring floods. And if there was no thunder and lightning we could sometimes persuade Jane Mac to let us play mud soccer on the grassy expanse of the A-field. Barefoot and in swimsuits, we played with a kickball, and sliding in the wet grass was more likely intentional than an effort to steal the ball. From a counselor's viewpoint, two of the best things were rest hour and bedtime. Rest hour was extended on those days, and boy did we need that catch-up time. And with rain on our cabins's tin roofs the boys didn't try to stay awake whispering--they couldn't hear each other! We may have taken white shorts and T-shirts to camp, but when we went home they were tinged with red clay stains forever--Tide XK or no Tide XK.

Camp also had the puddles that we in the Sandhills of North Carolina don't tend to see. Here at home, after a downpour of even the highest magnitude, most of the water soon seeps through the sandy soil (Do I like tongue twisters? Yes). Jennifer went to Camp Cherokee with me and Judy the summer before Amanda's birth, 1982. Shortly after we came home to the Sandhills we had a rainy day, and that night Jennifer called me back into her room after we'd said our prayers and turned out the lights. She had had an interesting realization. "Daddy (I hadn't become 'Dad' yet), it rained today and the mud didn't come out!"

Today was one of those steady, drippy days that I've come to love and appreciate. I did something I'd never tried before, which I think is environmentally wise in these days of frequent drought. My brother Buddy had mentioned washing his cars when it rains, and I proceeded to wash the '90 Toyota, '73 Mercury wagon, and Judy's Toyota Tacoma with the steady showers supplying the rinse. My bare feet relished the fond memories of when they had known such freedom in days gone by. Definitely, good memories.