Memories

It is deliciously cool outside today; a coffee-on-the-porch kind of day.  Man of the House and I have  lived in so many different climates in our years together, and each place, each home, has had those days when I just want to curl up with a hot drink, a blanket and a really good book. 

It had been twenty years between the time we had left the Desert Southwest and our return.  It surprised me how much I had forgotten about the desert.  The sights, the people, the different cacti, and the smell.  We were blessed to have a deep back porch on our condo where my sweet poodle and I could sit and enjoy the outdoors together, even on a rainy day.  In the South and Midwest (think Kansas), It can rain sideways, in circles, in sheets, and if you are on the porch or deck, you are definitely going to get wet.  However, in the desert, when it rains, it rains straight down. 

I remember that first good rain after our return.  I saw it moving across the desert from the south toward our neighborhood.  I could smell the dust that precedes the storm.  It brought back memories of monsoon season as a child, when we would have to go in the house from playing. Mom might have popped some popcorn and we would play board games or watch TV.  (Remember After School Specials?)  The rain never lasted very long, and with the windows open, we could feel the air cool off almost instantly. But it was the smell AFTER the rain that stayed strongest in my memories. The smell of greasewood and wet earth.  Memories of breathing deeply and smelling that fresh air all the way to my lungs and back.    You can’t bottle that smell. 

As my faithful companion and I sat on our porch the afternoon of that first rain, my mind rushed with memories.  My lungs were so happy to breath the fresh air.  I already had my coffee and a good book, so while the rain lasted, we just enjoyed every second of it.  I didn’t get up to get a sweater; the rain wouldn’t last that long.  I didn’t even warm up my coffee.  I just sat in that deliciously cool moment and thanked God for being so creative as to make even the rain in myriad ways.

And I also gave thanks for the memories.