The Right Attitude to Rain

My title is nicked! I admit it without shame. It belongs to a book by Alexander McCall Smith that I hoped would provide me with a little wisdom. I was attracted by its title which turned out to have no discernible connection with the storyline or debate held within its pages. Maybe I missed something. I am fascinated by weather of all shapes and sizes. My blogs are full of it. Apologies to those who do not share my obsession. However, it is a part of my English heritage that I cannot shake. I am sitting today with a view out of my window over the Welsh hills. The hills are beautiful: not craggy, but escaping domesticity by their sharp outline and steep inclines. But they are not the primary object in view today. Today I am seeing, with some regret, the rain. It pours incessantly down, tainting everything around me with a greyish tinge and a misty quality. The earth is already saturated and the footpaths are caked in mud. It is a Romantic artist's dream but it just isn't doing it for me today. I am reaching the end of my tether with its drabness, wetness and depressing permanence.

 

I am a newcomer to Wales and well aware that Wales can be wet. Of course it's wet. We are slap bang in the course of the warm, wet Westerlies! Blessed with a hot, dry (short) summer, we were lulled into a false sense of security at first, but we knew in our hearts that this was beginners' luck and that the rain would surely come. And come it has. We can comfort ourselves that in this freak winter the whole country is sharing our misfortune this year and some with far worse consequences than ours. However, we know that this steady influx of dampness is normal here and it is no good being surprised, indignant or unprepared.

 

With this thought in mind, I picked Alexander's volume off the shelf with some eagerness, but found only the ongoing deliberations of its protagonist concerning the pros and cons of embarking on an affair with a much younger man. Not much about rain. Isabel Dalhousie can be relied upon to debate the rights and wrongs of moral philosophy in her life and everyone else's with as much diligence and enthusiasm as Mr. Cameron, although with less dogmatic certainty, but sadly she offered me no wisdom on the right attitude to rain. I am therefore forced, as I gaze out on an over-abundance of the stuff, to concoct my own cocktail of home-grown remedies. Having gone to the trouble, I might as well try them out on you.

 

Positive thinking is all the rage nowadays and very beneficial it can be. So perhaps it would help to dwell, if I can, on the positive aspects of rain. Let us begin by rearranging our vocabulary on the subject. Dull, depressing and grey will be scrubbed from the list immediately. No, rain is clear, cool and refreshing. It does not drip annoyingly down, and it does not flood. Rain pours, engulfs, forms white torrents, fills things that were empty, replenishes things that were in need, lubricates and loosens and, best of all, it goes with the flow... (It is harder to think of these things in a positive light when it is a chilly winter's day - better in the hot days of summer when dry and weary matter and people are in need of refreshment. Oh for those balmy days of summer...)

 

To continue, water must be thought of as a positive benefit... (This is a little tricky right now, with thoughts of unnaturally high tides, rising river levels, flooded homes and damaged promenades rise to the surface. However, the case is far from hopeless.) Just think of the concept of 'flow' alone. Where would we writers be without it? Gushing, pouring, flowing and over-abundance are transformed into heavenly visions when considered beside the ideas of thirst, drought, parched river beds, Water Aid or even writer's block! So, the right attitude to rain! I have done my best. I have tried to channel my thoughts, my vocabulary and my attitudes to the best of my ability. I have tried not to give in to the common mistakes of always complaining that there is too much or too little of something. I have tried to maintain a balanced viewpoint.

 

Are you convinced yet?