1,000 Words For Rain

We've had the most awesome summer. Weeks of un-ending sun. Temperatures in the high 70s. It has been bliss. Pure bliss. I so needed a summer like this. After this past winter I just needed the sun. I needed it to warm me from the inside out. I got it. I'm feeling whole again. Happy and fulfilled.

The rain is back. But, I'm not sad about it. I am actually happy to see it. Is that weird? Last week was full of hard rain. The kind that washes everything away so you can start fresh. A new day. The kind that makes you just want to curl up on the couch and read a book.

I'm watching the rain come down and listening to it beat against the window pane. I've cracked the window just a bit to enjoy the cool breeze. I'm reading a book and working on my never ending moving to-do list. Sebastian is on the floor next to me playing with a pile of pennies and a naked Barbie doll we found at church yesterday. And I'm just enjoying the rain.

I've fought so hard this rain. I haven't wanted to let it in. I have let it make me depressed over the years. I've let it dictate how I spend my days. But this rain...it feels different. It is making me happy. Like an old friend come back to say hello. I never ever thought I'd say that.

Maybe that is what has been my problem all along. I've not let it become a part of me. I've always felt that accepting this Scottish rain would mean sadness. That it would mean I would have to be afraid of not knowing when I'd see the sun again. I thought it would make me Scottish. I'm not Scottish. I'm American. I thought accepting the rain would mean depression. That I'd be locked in a dark cave with no way out. It isn't that way anymore.

At least not today. I will miss the sun. I will always want her back. She is welcome to come to Scotland as much as she can. But, this rain belongs here. Maybe I'm beginning to belong here too.