Just a simple little rain storm

What is it about being outside at night just before a thunderstorm hits?  A cool breeze blows across you, and your skin, just the tiniest bit moist from the warm evening, positively drinks in the air.  Such weather inspires one to bare all, just so that the entire body can drink its fill of the atmosphere.  Fear of someone driving by or of frightening one of the neighbors prevents the return to the natural.  But the desire is there.   The air smells crisp and clear…like it was freshly washed, and now it blows freely like a three-year-old child running around naked after a bath.  Impish.  Playful.   Totally free of all inhibitions and acting as if existence is a wonderful thing.  You breathe in, treating your lungs to the sensation.  So used are they to the stale, stuffy air of the indoors they positively sing with joy with a taste of the innocent wind.   The colors of the suburban street at night are glorious in their subtlety.  There are trees full of spring leaves, glowing with a deep and vibrant green from the streetlights.  The leaves play their own game with the wind…push me and I will fly in this place…I am free but bound to this place.  Push me to hard and I will become detached from my source…and I will die soon afterward.  But not tonight.  Tonight is for joy and play.   The leaves flicker in the lights, an ever-changing show of green.  They cast shadows that shimmer and sparkle on the sidewalks and the grass.  The grass itself bows and rolls to the wind, waves of green ripple across the lawn.  The color show is mesmerizing, it’s beauty so overpowering that you feel small and insignificant within it.  You retreat to the porch, and the bushes are giving the same show.  Nevertheless, you feel safer here.   And then, finally, the rain comes.  Too dark to see it fall from the sky, you can hear it first.  Just a sudden, wet wave of sound.  And then the sidewalks grow darker and start to shine.  Puddles form…liquid pools of pure reflection, a place you can finally see the individual drops stop their descent.  You long to go running out and play, but a chill hits you…either a chill of air or a chill of cowardice.  It’s ok, though.  It has been enough.  You are itching to write about it.   From inside the house you hear the rain splashing against the roof.  There is one, non-intimidating roll of thunder.  It doesn’t seem possible that such a skinny flash of lightning could create such a rich, deep sound.  What would the earth sound like if it were split open?  How much different could this sound be?   This post is just a small snapshot of everyday life.  It describes a beauty to rich to be captured by any medium made by man.  It’s something that has happened ever night for almost a week now…   I usually just sleep right through it.