Rainy Season

Almost every afternoon, it starts to rain. Fontok, I think--it's raining. I'm pleased to hear the same word echoed across the street, confirmation that those thai lessons are paying off, in small ways. My life has become an endless vocab quiz.


The first drops fall softly, would be almost imperceptible were it not for street after street of densely packed tin roofs amplifying them, and everyone in Chiang Mai sighing an echo. Relief. The humid haze we've labored to breathe through lifts and suddenly the city glows, the trees in the garden are radiant. I wish I was good with a camera, wish I could show you this miracle of rain and sun and light and shade and drop and leaf and Beauty.
Rest.


The construction workers across the street, the parking attendant in the lot behind the house, her little daughter, the girl's puppy, my neighbor Wi Lai, her grandmother, and I all take cover but don't go inside--we sit and watch. We wait. We enjoy.


I've always liked the rain, but here it stops me in my tracks, stuns me. Daily.


"People live in history as fish live in water," one of the first readings we did for hngr said. In Northern Thailand, at least this time of year, they live in both.