The Smell of Rain
I love the smell of rain.
I love the sound of rain.
Heck, I love how all five senses seem to come alive when rain begins to fall. Rain shifts moods. It changes energy. It causes contemplation.
I have so many memories of how rain has affected my life—my day, my activities, even the way I remember a particular place or time.
One of my favorite rain memories comes from my childhood camp, Camp Oakes.
Our YMCA branch reserved the residential sleepaway camp for a particular week every August, and going to camp at that particular time of year meant a few wonderful things:
First, it was the perfect ending to a long summer break before returning to school.
Second, we almost always got a spectacular night-sky show. The Perseid meteor shower never failed to emote loud , “Oooohs. Awwwws. Ahhhhh” from the campfire audience
Third, the evenings in the mountains were beginning to cool. After the heat of summer, those chilly mountain nights felt refreshing and invigorating.
But there was a fourth reason why I loved being in the mountains in August.
The afternoon rain.
You see, I was typically in charge of eight to ten campers under the age of twelve, and those afternoon rainstorms often arrived directly after lunch—right around Rest Period.
And I LOVED Rest Period. (I still do!)
During that little pocket of the afternoon, the girls and I might lie quietly on our bunks. Some would write letters home to their parents. Others would continue working on a camp craft. And sometimes, they would get their hair braided by me. French-braid pigtails.
I kind of loved this.
I would line up the campers, either standing near or sitting on my bunk, and one by one I would braid their hair while we talked quietly. There was no expectation of perfection. No need to worry about being a beauty queen. No boys to impress.
It was simply a little ritual of self-care and grooming shared among a group of girls under twelve who trusted me enough to sit still while I braided their hair.
And outside, the rain fell.
There might be quiet conversation in the cabin. Perhaps the soft, heavy breathing—or even snoring—of someone asleep on a nearby bunk. Nobody worried about missing an activity.
There was no FOMO.
Because it was raining. Activities weren't happening anyway. And besides, it was a Rest Period. So instead of thinking about where we needed to go next or what we might be missing, we simply got to be there.
Together. Listening to the rain. Talking quietly. Braiding hair. Resting.
There was nothing particularly extraordinary about what we were doing, and maybe that is precisely why the memory has stayed with me. We weren't trying to create a memory. We weren't taking pictures of it. We weren't posting it somewhere so other people could witness it.
We were simply witnessing the moment with one another. And it was beautiful.
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