It's Gonna Rain

I wish I could find a free MP3 of this song, but the lyrics have been going through my head for about the last 10-12 days. I can't see the local weather on weather.com before May 11, but we've had rain every single day since except for Mother's Day, and I know it rained for several days before that. Not just a pleasant little drizzle (though it was like that for a couple of days) but drenching, pouring, can't see the house across the street, camaros flooded up to the hood, torrential-defining rain.

When I lived in Ohio, I got used to little sunshine. I was in a cloud belt that cut across the state, and there were more cloudy days than not. I remember when I moved to Michigan being so surprised at how often the sun seemed to shine, even in the winter. One weekend I headed down to Columbus on a beautiful sunny Saturday morning, and when I hit Findley, Ohio, I hit the cloud belt. I went back to Westland on Sunday evening, and the clouds broke when I got past Findley, and the sun shone the rest of the way home.

My four years in Lubbock were an amazing time for me. The sun shone all the time, relentlessly. It was very windy; my realtor told me that hair spray was a big seller in West Texas, but I really didn't care, because the sun was always shining. DH and I had a little routine we'd do on the way to work (said in a disgusted voice): "Another beautiful, sunny day." The landscape was so flat, it was like the anti-mountains; nothing to block the sky - no hills, no trees, no buildings more than 10 stories high. I quickly came to appreciate where the local marketing saying, "Lubbock has more sky" came from.

I had hoped that the added humidity in Louisiana would prevent wrinkles, as frown lines had started appearing on my forehead right before I moved here. But the moisture in the air hasn't prevented aging like I'd hoped, and at this point I would trade even a few wrinkles for a day or five of sunshine and big blue sky.

A few days ago, the little boy was looking at the lilies out front. Some of them have not yet opened, and he said, "I think the flowers need some water." Um, no. They have plenty of water. I think he has not yet made the connection between watering and rain.

Older son graduates on Thursday night. Tonight is the senior video. He is the emcee. I got his report card in the mail earlier this week. His GPA (unweighted) for the two years we've been here is 4.000. His overall GPA (unweighted) is 3.8216. I am so very proud of all he's accomplished. He's excited about heading off to college and he's made some wonderful friends in the last few months, all of whom are going off to college with him. I need to sign him up for pre-testing and a dorm room. I don't know what I will do when he's gone. For so many years, he was "my guy."

Maybe it won't be so bad. DH doesn't care that the house is a mess, so it will be a relief to not have someone complaining about what a mess the house is, without actually doing anything to change things.