It rained yesterday for a goodly part of the day.  Hard.  I know that because Rian and I were tromping around town in it, gathering up site partners and talking to good people.  Everyone here understands when you walk in with their informational packet wrapped in plastic, your hair askew, and your makeup running.

It quit, or more accurately slowed, early afternoon.  Late afternoon, clear of tasks for the moment, I headed for my daily hike in the woods with a van full of dogs (358.8 pounds in four black-and-tan bodies officially qualifying as a van full).  We got there just before 5:00 (the days are getting longer again, have you noticed?), in time to walk the first mile through the forest without a lamp.  And when we came out of the woods at the river a mile later than that, there was still enough light at the bottom of the gorge to sit on a wet rock by the river for a few minutes and enjoy the rampage before the late dusk turned to full dark.

It is a function of human, that when you’re in the middle of flourescent and traffic and phones and people all day, you don’t think about what that inconvenient rain and a relatively warm day means in the wilder parts of your world.

The Sandy was running high and loud and beautiful with rain and snow melt.  The huge sitting rock at the edge of the beach was six feet out in the river, the boulders at the bottom were gently knocking into each other, the air was crisp and clean and six kinds of jazzed up with ions, the sky had cleared enough to show a swath of stars sparkling in the cold.  It takes all of thirty seconds in that environment to wash out a day and drop you into sweet peace.  Try it some day, when it’s been raining all day and still might be a little.  Hike a muddy trail, get a little wet, take a happy dog, brave the dark.  You’ll walk out new, I promise.

LLH