Hard Rains

Everything smells like that wonderful early spring earth as everything begins to thaw. We don't get freezes and thaws, but heavy rains seem to bring that same beautiful smell.

When the skies start out like this in the morning, you know there's going to be a BIG storm. The weather showed really bad storms through the lower Gulf states, just barely touching Florida. Lots of damage from high winds and tornadoes. This time of year we have so many storms because the south is still very warm and the north is already very cold. when the weather patterns stream some of that cold air down south, it creates huge storms.

I love to watch the storm clouds build.. they look like great big squeezable scoops of cotton against the blue skies. They rise like mushrooms till the tops begin to sheer off and then we have thunder storms. We had a little rain during the night, but a very loud thunder storm this morning. Sometimes it rattles the dishes. Fortunately it was very brief with LOTS of rain.

We've been blessed this year as far as storms go. I think we had our quota the last two years. We had no real hurricanes and very little prolonged downpours to cause flooding. I think people are breathing a sigh of relief.

At times the rain is so hard you can't see across the street. Other times its huge, beautiful rain drops. Summer rains are wonderful for being a kid again. My grandchildren provided so many opportunities to 'play' in the rain. Now that they are all grown, I either have to take full responsibility or just plead second childhood. My daughter Lisa has a privacy fence and spends many rains 'indulging'.

I love how digital cameras capture the big drops mid air.. the water was just streaming off the jatropha. Everything looks and feels so refreshed after a hard rain. We've had a lot of fairly windy, dry days and dust and dirt covers so many of the leaves. Now they've had a bath.

I'm hoping the rain wasn't hard enough to harm my cassia. It has so many buds of promise. I'd like it to last long enough for my new camera to get here. I am SO excited. It has all the features I thought I wanted. I feel like a kid waiting for Christmas!