Spring Rain

Today when my son and I woke to get ready for school it was dark and rainy. I promised myself I didn't have to run in the 40 degree rain, and after dropping Wuggie at school, rolled out my yoga mat in front of the window. I did my first few sun salutations, listening to the rain on the window. The rain reminds me of winter in California, and I remembered the feeling of running in the rain on a warm spring day. I refuse to think of 40 as warm, but I thought about how it is not supposed to get out of 20s in the next 10 days, put on my running shoes and rain jacket and headed out.

This time of year is as awkward as child entering adolescence. The piles of ice and snow left by the plows, now dark with exhaust and dirt, still squat on every corner, though every other surface is covered with the damp degrading fall leaves now clear of snow, and things are just kind of muddy. I was shocked to see the first shoots of crocuses poking through under a bush by my front steps, and hope they will be okay as the ground re-freezes later this week. I ran along a creek filled with rushing brown water, the drainage of not only the rain but the melted snow. There was one giant iceburg in the middle behind which the ducks were hiding. As I ran downstream giant rectangles of ice had broken free and smashed into one another in a kind of spring-thaw rush hour traffic jam. Further downstream yet the ice was solid, and I imagined the water rushing below it to the lake.

Leaving behind so many dear friends in California, I always think of them when the weather does something weird. "Come look at this!" I want to say, but by the time they got on a plane and flew 3000 miles, the brown speckled songbird would probably have moved out from under the bush, and the ice would have moved downstream. And so I blog, in a vain attempt to share it. This one's for you guys.