Osprey
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3694
Registered: 5-23-2004
Location: Baja Ca. Sur
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Tropical rain
Thanks Skipjack and others for the nice comments on Baja darkness. Here's a reprise of the rain piece for Skipjack. It has been updated since it was
posted several years ago.
Rain
With five, count em’ five average days of rain per year (3.5 inches) in my little village I have a reason to note just how it feels, how it sounds.
The range of the sounds is astounding because there are so many kinds of rain, so many objects for the drops to hit. Rain sounds are different at your
place than they are at mine. We have different gardens, roofs, shades, patios.
My personal rains, the ones at my house, hit the palm thatch roof of my living room and patio. They pelt the papayas, the arbol de fuego, the big
pistachios, the royal platano de jardin. They beat upon the adokin, the pavers that are my front drive, dirt yard, dirt street, the fountain in my
small garden. Each surface produces a slightly different sound, the slant, speed and volume of the rain differs from storm to storm, changes minute by
minute.
The rare summer showers that slowly creep down from the canyons in August begin with a hissing sound, barely audible at first because the droplets are
so small, dewlike, just barely visible. Then, as the clouds darken, the drops grow larger they begin to play their distinctive beat around the place.
It is a most welcome symphony. The big leaves of the garden banana plant resonate under the pressure of the large drops while the fronds of thatch of
the patio roof disperse each drop, soften what could be a harsh pelting sound to almost a murmur.
As the huge anvil of water in the main part of the rainstorm becomes a dark dome above our village, the rain increases. The drops grow huge and fall
with great force to make a mixing of all the sounds that preceded it, built up in volume to become another more powerful and furious white noise.
Perhaps my favorite sounds come just as the last drops fall and things begin to make rhythms as they drip. The dripping from the thatch hanging down
around the patio becomes a rough pattern, each droplet having its own place in the scale, the distance to the dirt marking the tone, the cadence with
more order and finally less sound. Then, when I'm sure I've heard the very last drop, a lonely silence falls upon the place. For the next few hours
the new kind of unholy stillness quite sops up, dries out my short lived joy, nature’s rhythm section in the tropics. This is a very thirsty part of
the world where every drop brings or renews life to something important – the sound, the rhythm and movement is a bonus and I never want to miss it as
it is all soaked up in what seems like just the blink of an eye.
This passerby, this welcome stroller is in no way related to the killing deluges that can spell destruction and sorrow for those who cannot or will
not step aside.
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Iflyfish
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3747
Registered: 10-17-2006
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Wonderful, could feel, hear and touch it. No wonder Skipjack likes this one! I hope people rain compliments on you for this piece. Stunner!
Iflyfishinaweofosprey'swriting
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wessongroup
Platinum Nomad
Posts: 21152
Registered: 8-9-2009
Location: Mission Viejo
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Mood: Suicide Hot line ... please hold
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Thanks much.. very nice..
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