It's Raining. It's Pouring. (Place #2)

So this is what happens when you decide to procrastinate the day of your blog entry. The day is filled with monsoon like rains. Yes, it's true. I decided to go to my place on Father's Day because I don't live near my father and I don't really celebrate it. Instead, I decided to go to the park before meeting my friends for brunch. Needless to say it was a good thing that I didn't shower beforehand.

Sadly, this might be the only time during the summer that I will have the park, at least my section of it, to myself.

The rain when I began my place meditation was more of a light drizzle. Utah, is not known for its rain. Usually if it rains during the summer months it only lasts for minutes. Today was an exception to the rule and I can hear the feint prayers of gratitude for the moisture with every drop that hits the ground.

I love the smell of the earth when it is wet. Actually, I love the smell of the earth as it begins to receive its gift from the heavens. The smell automatically makes me want to dig around the roots of the tree I'm sitting under for a small rock to suck on. When I was young growing up in Small Town, Idaho I would always suck on rocks in weather like this. The rain would bounce off of the red sand that cradled the road. The smell of the sand beginning to make clay mixed with the hot steam coming off of the road is the most enticing smell to me. I would stop and find a nicely sand coated rock and stick it in my mouth. When the flavor was gone I would throw the rock on the ground sprinkle sand on top of it and place it back on my tongue where it belonged.

As I sit underneath my tree and smell the freshly moistened grass and leaves and soil I smile. It is the first time I am genuinely happy this week. I am happy because I was able to focus my attention onto something else besides the present. This has been a rough couple of months for me filed with everything including a clichéd broken heart. The broken heart followed me from Pennsylvania and has been a constant companion wherever I go. Today was the first day, I feel, that I was able to not think about for at least a good five minutes. That, pathetic as it may seem, is five more minutes than I had yesterday.

The rain is starting to pour now. I can hear the birds, I wish I knew what kind of birds they were, up above me gossiping away. I wonder if they think that I am ridiculous for being outside when I could be inside a warm house. Maybe they are chastising me like my own mother would be doing if she saw me right now without a jacket on, only a hoodie to keep me warm. I envision them telling me that I'm going to catch a cold. Using me as an example for their own children as what not to do.

As I begin to walk home from the park, I take my hoodie off of my head and just let the cold rain hit me. I stand in the middle of the field whispering my own thanks for the moisture that we are receiving, but more than that I am thanking Him for giving me those precious five minutes. Those precious five minutes that I was able to experience out in the open.

I am coughing now, but I am smiling.