Feeling the Rain

It rained recently where we live. Lots and lots of rain coming down. Lovely to curl up in bed and hear it pattering gently on the window. And lovely, apparently, to let your children play in without a care in the world.

That's straight out of Chapter 12 in the Clampett's for Life book of parenting. We live by it. So naturally those were our children in the alley behind our house splashing in the river.

 

We also discovered there was a lake at the end of the alley so we checked that out too. Exploring. That's another chapter in the book.

Although I went a little paranoid helicopter mom and decided we should explore with our flip flops on because this is random water in the street and it was starting to creep me out a little.  Rain is clean and rejuvenating.  Pooling water on your street is distinctly brown and more gag inducing if you think about it too much.  Flip flops it is.

But it's fun. A special kind of fun as they realize the whole activity is to just play in the rain.

This is a nut that knows how to embrace life.  Dirt, rain, tears, whatever.  Arms wide ready for it.  He will be a regular at the local emergency room but, man, is that kid going to have stories to tell.

Kids get so used to hustling to get out of the rain. They're so used to trying to stay dry. Watching them quietly settle into getting wet and embracing the rain as part of the fun is the stuff childhood is made off.  When I was a kid, I loved going out in the rain. Twirling, walking, running. Umbrella. No umbrella.

The world is such a quiet simple place when it's raining.  Less cars on the street.  Less neighbors out walking their dogs. I like that my kids had the benefit of each other out there in the rain with them. Life is more fun when there's someone to splash. Just ask my husband.

He gave the water a few splashes strictly for quality control purposes.  To be sure the splash quality was up to to snuff.   Naturally.

A good 30 minutes later and 2 dripping kids and we called it a day.   Not before a quick canonball contest in the pool on the way in though.  Because you're already wet and so what if the pool is freezing cold?  If you jump in, you won't even have time to worry about it.

It's funny how you can head home after a long day at the office with one idea of what your evening has in store for you.  And then life just steps in and takes your evening in a different direction.  A good kind of different direction.  Sweet and simple and laughing together.

Posing like pirates.  In the rain.  Don't the two go hand in hand?

Theses are the good days.    We'll pretend no one wept and pouted because the fun should never ever have to end regardless of what time it is and whether or not anyone has eaten dinner.  We'll also pretend that no one bickered with their brother over the toothpaste, her spot on the bed and the pee on the toilet seat. 

Good days aren't good because no one bickers.  Not to me anyway.  To me, good days are good because the joy and fun make the bickering just part of the noisy nonsense.  Good days make it easy to ignore the noisy nonsense and not let it ramp your stress level sky high.  I like to think of it as flying over the tree tops with the noise below me.  Because my house is hella noisy and chaotic.  Even on good days.   It's just about the good outweighing the noise and chaos.  It's fun when it does.  And this time it did.