Rainy Season

We have now officially begun the rainy season here in Guatemala. I am told that it will carry through until around September or October, when we will begin the not-rainy season. During the rainy season, it rains every day (sounds like home, right?) for several hours, usually just in the afternoon. Some years it is really predictable and always starts and stops at a certain time. Some years, it is a little more random. Who knows what kind of year we will have.

The bad things about the rainy season are discussed a lot around here and lamented about to me by other volunteers. Your clothes never dry, you get rained on wherever you go, Guatemalans don’t go out in the rain, there is mud everywhere. Every volunteer I talk to hates the rainy season and assures me that with time, I will find a special place of disdain in my heart for this time of year.

Maybe it is the Northwesterner in me, but despite it all I still love the rain. There is a certain kind of understanding that the rain brings, and a certain part of my soul that really feels the emotion of the rain. It doesn’t make me sad, just content, like the world understands me a little better. Rain makes everything smell cleaner, makes the corn in the fields grow tall, and makes the land a little greener. The sound of the rain lets me sleep better at night.

Guatemalans think I am crazy to like the rain. They have a level of respect for the rain that makes their crops grow, but they personally hate it. They hate getting wet, they hate mud. When it rains here, the streets are completely empty. The sight of someone walking in it, especially without an umbrella and without a disgusted look on their face, is very strange. I have lived my whole life with rain, and I have learned not to let it slow me down. If I had plans to go out, I go. If I need to walk somewhere, I enjoy the fresh smell and the feeling of raindrops on my head.

Rain reminds me of home. They say I will grow to hate it, but I don’t believe them. I am from the Northwest: I have rain in my soul.