Surcease From the Pain

Or make that rain. Rain is like a headache…you are pretty aware of it when it is going on, but it is hard to pinpoint the exact moment when it is gone. Suddenly you realize the pain/rain is no longer there. Night before last night, I woke up about 3:00 a.m. and realized it was unnaturally quiet. No drops drumming on the roof, no rivulets streaming down the window pane, no gutter overflow dripping. The rain had stopped. Providing a brief respite and a Gore-Tex-Free Day.

The paper advises us that it has rained 30 of the past 31 days. That is quite a bit of water whirling around. The Willamette is overflowing and the Columbia lingers near flood stage. It is impossible to talk about much else. Especially for those folks whose houses are flooded or washed away down the hillside. Scenes of frantic homeowners desperately shoveling mud or filling sand bags on the news every night.

Certainly spending time in nature out here requires an awareness of wetness. And being outdoors for any reason is an exercise in maintaining dryness. This is Oregon Winter and the rain is what makes the Northwest so green and beautiful. But it is nice to have a break and walk the dogs without an umbrella. There’s more to come and Winter is long from over. But on the plus side, I have not needed my Cabela down coat yet and the temps are much milder than the Midwest. No snow shoveling. No four-wheel drive to get home after work. I count my blessings and damp is a notch up from frozen.