Day 247– December 11, 2014

The storm descends. Weather forecasters predict high winds, 2-3 inches of rain, and the fiercest storm in five years. In New England, such predictions would alarm residents to stock up on canned goods, buy batteries, and tape windows.

Here in California, we faff dismally. Dennis denigrates the hysteria as “The Mists of the Millenium.” Ruben “advises his students not to mention the storm to anybody outside of California or else be mercilessly teased.”

I hear the rain on the porch’s tin awning. I don’t want to get up. I don’t want to go out. Fortunately I have neither job nor food emergency. The kitchen ceiling might leak. California reservoirs need the water.

I shall bike in the downpour to my last swim class. It feels silly to complain about rain and not make it to swimming.

After such a long year and a recent breakup, the storm helps hibernation. Wind and water clean the slate. I listen to a Grateful Dead song, “Looks Like Rain” about an impending storm and a breakup. The sappy lyrics read appropriate:

I woke today

Felt your side of bed

The covers were still warm where you lay

You were gone

My heart was filled with dread

You might not be sleeping here again

(chorus)

It’s all right because I love you

That’s not going to change

Run me around. Make me hurt again and again.

But I’ll still sing you love songs

Written in letters of your name

Brave the storm to come for it surely looks like rain

Did you ever wake to the sound of stray cats making love?

From their cries you can tell

Haste is the last thing they are thinking of

They are only trying to make it through the night

(chorus)

Yes, Brave the storm to come for it surely looks like rain

Looks like rain

Looks like rain, feels like rain, hear you rain

Looks like rain, feels like rain, again and again

All my life I’ve seen rain, and I’ve seen rain

Here it comes again

I can’t stand, I can’t stand it, no,

I can’t stand the rain

I can’t stand it, no,

I can’t stand the rain