How Do You Celebrate the First Daytime Downpour of the Rainy Season?
How Do You Celebrate the First Daytime Downpour of the Rainy Season?
In our house, after the move to Boston from California, we have developed a tradition of greeting the first snowfall almost as if it were something sacred. After 11 years of not seeing snow during our time out West, the first fluffy flakes of the season in Boston are a momentous occasion. I'll never forget the first time the kids saw those flakes come down our first Fall-going-into-Winter back East. Their eyes were so big. I knew I had to do something to mark the day. We piled in the van to go to a coffee shop (where else would you find me on a cold day in Boston?) and get a “proper” hot chocolate with fancy whipped topping and chocolate syrup drizzled on top. We ate our raisins and snacks, while sipping hot drinks and looking out the window. Every year since, hot cocoa is our way to say “hi” to the first signs of winter.
Here on Kwaj, when each day, week, month, looks the same, and you can mark time by how long the palm branches are getting as they droop and how big the coconuts are maturing into before they drop down, we look for ANY excuse or change to find something to celebrate. Sometimes that is a care package from a loved one, but today, it was the first daytime downpour of the rainy season. As Christopher returned from school this afternoon, drenched from head to toe (despite the rain parka he was wearing), I quickly got towels to dry him off, offered dry clothes, and started warming the milk. If you walk into a highly air-conditioned house after the rain, it can really chill you; it is the closest thing we get to low temps around here or that cold, wet winter air we miss. I didn't even think about it; I just started making the cocoa. It was a natural reaction. And as we sat around the table talking about how this is now the kind of thing we have to celebrate instead of the first snow, I think that the older kids and I realized in that moment how life changes, and you don't even fully notice, until one day you wake up and you are experiencing something so VERY DIFFERENT than before. California to Massachusetts was a transition all on its own with smaller highways, no “real” freeways, lots of quaint towns, colder temps, the Big Dig, and the word “wicked” as an extra modifier in a descriptive sentence, but here, wow. Nine months later, and I'm still in shock some days that we wake up to this place. It will feel like a brief dream when I wake up one day again in Boston in a small, cozy house with a fireplace (I hope).
So, the rains have started, the rust on our bikes will increase, the winds will stop (making each bike ride that much hotter), and the rain parkas need to be “at the ready” at all times now. Life will be wet until the end of October. But, it also means we have come through almost two seasons (wet, dry, and back to wet again) now, and we are veterans on the island. It means, to us, that we will be back in the States soon to see family (in several states) and Boston friends after a year away. It means one child will be a third-grader, one a kindergartner, and one will lose his “toddler status” and turn into a preschooler. It means: We did it! We got through a big change. Those prayers we said as a family about coming here and making it work were heard. While there are days I still struggle to not be down or bored here, I have established a sense of community. I know how to do this now. I have friends here to come back to. I have new things to try next year, new things to be involved in, and old things to make us feel like we've already “been there and done that,” and they will fit like an old shoe. I have found it is really important to have some old, comfortable things in life that you have done before that offer a sense of security and what to expect as well as new opportunities to stretch us. This first year was about trying on mostly “new things,” and I think that was truly hard in many ways. For myself, it meant facing feelings of negativity and insecurities I didn't realize I had. There wasn't much old-to-us or familiar but our own 5 faces to fall back on. But next year, we face a time of being more adjusted, and perhaps it will be our best Kwaj year to remember. But, despite the hard moments of adjustment, looking back, this year has offered us so many great experiences, and we are grateful for that.
The rain can be a real downer when it dumps onto your head every day for 6 months straight as you bike along. I've only a few times really experienced rain like this before coming here. It is as if a million angels in the sky count: “1,2,3, dump” and turn an entire lake onto our heads in a few seconds' time. These aren't sprinkles. They are torrential downpours. But, just like my own insecurities being new where everyone else seems to be friends already, to “have the hang of it” here on Kwaj, and to know the drill here, it's all in how you take it. Do we see the rain and think: “Oh, dread!” Or do we make hot cocoa? I am reminded of the verse:
“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things.” --Philippians 4:8
So, as one country music singer (Jo Dee Messina) belts it out, “Bring on the rain!” We're ready for it. Our cocoa mugs are out and ready to go. And so is our bottle of WD-40 to service our bike chains! :)
Saturday, May 10, 2008