Rain is a sight. The hot, sticky summer provides the best downpours. I like these downpours even over winter ones, though winter is my favorite season because I like red noses, scarves with imaginations of their own, flitting about around your neck. I am a fan of hard winter winds that shake your house to its core, or slide your car along a highway. The oasis that is your bed, the comfort that is your big fluff white comforter is all the more appreciated. But this is beside the point.

These summer downpours come late afternoon, after a hazy day full of malaise. The clouds puff up, become real dough like, get all grayish, and everything starts looking surreal. The green of the leaves becomes different, almost ardently pungent, but in a good way. There is a moment, right before the rain comes, when everything stops. Where quiet becomes silent, and the wind starts to rustle the leaves, just a bit. It is nice to see the leaves move, when everything else is still. It is close to sunset.

You don't often see orange and gray dance together. The sun peeks through the clouds, making all the malaise in the world worth it. The rain pounds. The bottom drops out. The rain makes its impression, even if short-lived, in comparison to the long day. This kind of rain is sex. I am going to go on to the next paragraph, but you can ponder on how rain is like sex, here, for a while, if you please.

Everything gets soaked, dirt is cleansed from cars, awnings from various stores drip, and the leaves are pressed down and some leaves drop, fall, from the pressure. On this particular day, people seek solace from that pounding in the coffee shop in which I happen to be sitting. Everyone is wet, and their teeth are chattering, because to sell coffee in the summer, you must make your coffee shop cold. I sit and watch them for a while.

Shannon, the man who I will eventually call my boyfriend, sits next to me. We are in this coffee shop most everyday. He usually works on drawings, while I work behind the bar. But I come in even when not working, cozy up in the large pillow-y chairs with a book, and retreat, headphones on. I take my apron off, and sink into one of those chairs, next to him. In my head, we strike up a conversation about how you never really love, because you never really know anything or anyone better than yourself, so you are only really in love with yourself. In reality, we sit there, looking at each other some, looking at the people some, but staring at the rain more.

The people create a dripping line in an otherwise blank, empty store. Everyone except really pretty people look ratty after getting drenched by the rain. What of people as rats? I mean, some people are on the inside. You know, lacking in scruples or whatever. But what if people were really big rats? The rats in New York City are about the size of people, so they say. But I mean real rat people, walking around with dresses on; their red eyes squinting, whiskers tickling. 'The cheese down at Sutton's is much better than that crap they serve at Subway,'� they'd comment to the other one on the way out of the door. Some of the people trickle out the door, coffee in hand. Wouldn't that be a sight, if they were rats? My imagination just takes off, like those scarves I like so much, just like this rain I can't get enough of. But they go nowhere. Their teeth still chatter, even after imagining them all as rats. Little puddles form by their feet. We all have our own private puddle when coming in after the rain. That is a metaphor for life.

'I love the rain,'� he says, with emphasis on the o, as to indicate deep affection. I am jarred from my rat imaginings.

'Me too,'� I say, gazing out the large 9 by 12 window that frames the store. I think about what it would be like, standing in the rain, kissing him. I desperately want him to want that too. But he's not my boyfriend yet. I have no idea what he is thinking, at all. Not in the cards today. We are just friends. However, I am taken up with this grandiose notion, feel very much like what a Romantic must feel like, like Wordsworth when he wrote 'Nutting,'� even though I don't, in all actuality, like Wordsworth. I like the idea though, to be so taken with a moment, and run with it. So, I do. I leave Shannon dumbfounded, mouth slack, sitting in his chair. I mumble something about needing to go home and change out of my work clothes. There will be no more sitting passively in chairs today. I think he understands. I probably looked like a woman bursting into a flame. I hope he likes fire. Partly for him, partly for myself, I am leaping into a passionate moment with the rain.

The first few drops are exhilarating. My face is gloriously wet; I have to squeeze my eyes shut, to squish water out of my eyes. I feel clean. But then I round the corner, see stoplights swinging in a fashion like myself, and realize that I am in love with the idea more than actually running in the rain. As I run, thighs thumping as I go, knees dripping, I know I look an idiot. I wore a skirt that day. Not a long one, but not a short one either. Black and practical. I certainly don't run very well. This skirt made me look as if I have long, awkward-for-my-height legs. Well, it doesn't make me look that way; I have those kinds of legs. My white shirt is soaked, clinging to my skin, and I imagine you can see my bra. I'm the cliché of exposure.

People with umbrellas stare at me as I walk by. I'm all gangly; I'm the drowned rat, with no oversized black umbrella to hide me. None of it makes any sense, as before, in the enchanting glow of warmly lit Starbucks. I become self conscious. After running two blocks, I forget why I started running, and become self aware. So, I let the rain soak me to my very core. I walk the rest of the way to my car, drudging with each step. I sit in the car, wetting the seat. It's warm out, and I feel sticky, though cold. I turn the ignition and watch the wipers swish. The rain on the roof and the wipers are the only sound accompanying my thoughts. How anticlimactic. I am supposed to come to some great realization about life. I am supposed to feel on fire, free, like that time I skinny dipped in Myrtle Beach, all pent up with teenage hormones, letting them fizzle out with the swirl of salt water. I don't feel what I expected. I'm not overwhelmed. My grandiosity is lost. Self awareness is the worst thing to happen to any of our spirited impulses, I mean, it made me stop running in the rain.

Rain makes me feel like I can write, even if only for a short while. What do you lose yourself in, if only for a few blocks?

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