Jackie Wells-Fauth
This has definitely been a tricky summer for rainfall. First, I was afraid there would be no rain, and now, it looks like the best way to get rain is in a deluge. A summer of contrasts, to be sure. Now I love the rain, just not inches of it in minutes! It can be very inconvenient—not to mention dangerous.
All this leads, of course, to what I want to talk about now. We were driving home from the cities, and I didn’t check the weather. I have always had a kind of contempt for those phone apps where they send a picture of the weather radar. Why not just find out what the weather will do in the old-fashioned way—by waiting for it to happen?
Okay, so I was wrong. Our sunny drive home from the cities was rudely interrupted by a set of storm clouds, building in the sky ahead of us. Roy was sleeping and I was driving, so I didn’t bother to check his phone radar. Those clouds were to the north, and they were far away. No problem, right?
Except that I drove into overcast skies with alarming rapidity. Then, before I knew it, there were sprinkles on my windshield, enough for an occasional swipe of the windshield wipers. After that, lightning began to appear in the sky ahead of us. What happened to my sunny day?
Sure enough, the light sprinkle turned into a heavy rain and then a downpour and then a deluge. I drove, cursing, keeping my eye on the taillights of the car in front of me and hoping no one was coming up too fast behind me. Roy, awakened by my whining, advised that perhaps we should pull over. Good idea.
We pulled into a farm driveway, hoping for a break. It didn’t help. The rain was coming down in sheets, blown across the roads and fields by an incredibly strong wind. We knew this couldn’t last forever (or so we hoped) and sure enough, within about ten minutes, it had let up somewhat. Not enough for me, but for Roy, it was important to get his pretty little car away from there before hail set in.
“I’m not driving in this,” I stated, my teeth still chattering.
“Then let’s switch; I’ll drive,” he said.
“I’m also not getting out in this,” I declared. There is the dilemma: how do we switch places with our old bodies in a car with bucket seats and a nervous dog in the back?
Roy began this little dance in the rain by laying his seat down completely and sliding into the back with said nervous dog. It was then for me to drag myself, bad knees and all, across the console and somehow, into the passenger seat. I was midway across when it occurred to me that I should have removed the water bottles from the console!
With every joint I have popping, I began to think that maybe getting out and getting wet wouldn’t be so bad. The rain increased at that moment just to convince me that somehow, I was going to have to complete this weird, car version of Twister without the benefit of leaving the car.
I somehow got my butt on the passenger seat, but with the seat still in the reclined position, I couldn’t brace myself to get my legs over. I ended up laying back against the dog, with my knees in my nose, so that Roy could climb over the driver’s seat and get behind the wheel.
He had already gotten the car in gear and was headed down the road, still in heavy rain, when I finally got all of my working parts in some semblance of the way God intended and left the dog to her backseat alone.
I’m trying to take comfort from the fact that at my age, I was actually able to complete that little dance with only minimum damage to my body and a complete loss of dignity, but I’m afraid that this is just one more grudge I have against the wild rain antics that this summer has presented.
May you all stay dry and upright through this summer. And would someone please show me how to put that weather radar app on my phone?
dropsinthewell 