Thoughts From the Rainy Season

Let’s make one thing perfectly clear. I am not going to complain about the rain, nor will I ever complain about the rain again. I know we have had quite a bit here in the month of June but I also know that it can shut off and we may not have any rain in the month of July. I also know that someone reading this will still be dealing with dry conditions and it just seems wrong to complain about rain. Of course, I am also aware of the fact that it will either be dry or wet and there is nothing I can do about it.

However, as I sit here I have become painfully aware of certain things during this wet stretch of weather. Let’s just say that I have had too much time to think about things. Therefore, I have decided to share my random thoughts from the monsoon season with you. Please hold your applause, and you can thank me later.

Random thought #1; nothing feels better than a rainy morning after a long stretch of dry weather. May was fairly dry and it allowed us to finish planting just ahead of the start of this unsettled weather pattern (that is some of my best metrological terminology). The first morning of waking up to rain on the roof and being able to enjoy my morning coffee watching the rain was wonderful. It is an experience that is second only to the first day back in the tractor seat when the weather finally straightens out again.

Mud is the by-product of wet weather and it is easy to deal with at first but it soon grows tiresome.  Mud tends to be everywhere; you can’t walk out of the house without getting some on you. After a couple of days wearing rubber knee boots, nothing is more refreshing that the first day it is dry enough to do chores in your leather boots.  Dumping water out of feed bunks goes hand in hand with doing chores in the mud. The water that is dumped out of the bunk has nowhere to go and you can’t get away from it. It did make me wonder if the EPA would designate the water in the feed bunks or in my boots as “Waters of the USA”.

I am always amazed at how slow days go by but how fast weeks seem to disappear. A day of being stuck in the house seems to last forty eight hours but I think someone must have misprinted the calendars this year. It seems as though they missed the first two weeks of June, we can’t possibly be nearing the end of the month; I have too much that didn’t get done. I don’t necessarily need both missing weeks back but an additional seven days in June would be nice.

Each year I forget what humidity is like. I just cannot get used to those mornings where it never gets below seventy-five degrees or seventy-five percent humidity. You have to love those mornings when shortly after starting chores you have already sweated through your hat and have sweat dripping off your nose.  While humidity is a bad thing for fat guys like me, I am amazed at how fast plants grow.  My corn seemed to grow several inches each hour, unfortunately so does the grass in my lawn. I guess you can’t have one without the other; at least I had time to mow the lawn.

Finally, I have asked myself over and over just why Noah decided to take those two mosquitoes on the Ark. I cannot think of any good reason for the mosquito’s existence on this earth. He probably did not intend to take any with him and they just showed up, much like they just show up anytime I am outside right now. I just wish he had packed a fly swatter and taken care of them and the flies while he had time during his period of unsettled weather.

I know I am whining and I should not be. I am very grateful for the rain and I really hope it keeps coming. I can deal with the side effects of precipitation because it is a lot easier to deal with too much rain than too little. Nothing is more miserable than to have nothing to do because everything is burning up during a drought. I guess in the end mud, humidity and mosquitoes are a good problem to have.