Rain, Rain, Come and Stay

I (secretly) like our (justifiably infamous) summers here. And what I like best are the afternoon thunderstorms that grace us many days like clockwork. But this August there was nothing—hardly a drop—and it was awful: relentless blinding white heat and merciless humidity.

The rains came back Sunday. The birds knew something was up and flocked outside our bedroom balcony in noisy throngs: a crow, a mockingbird, some turtle doves, and a swarming flock of starlings. (June recovered my bird book—she'd previously horded it—and insisted that I identify them all.) As the sky darkened and the first drops fell, the starlings grew silent and arrayed themselves in a strange, precisely regimented row along the telephone wire a hundred or more birds long.

Then it rained in earnest. The birds disappeared. The girls donned their raincoats and danced gleefully on the balcony.

It was a dance-worthy occasion.