Meandering With Bob

The sound of rain. What a glorious sound to hear. We live in southern California, and, thanks to the constant reporting, the entire world knows that we are in a drought. We are also, supposedly, in the middle of an El Niño. Every person I speak to is happy when it rains even when it means worse traffic, downed trees, and other problems. The state can use every single drop. While other states are praying for less rain and bad weather, our area sets out the “Weather Teams” as soon as a cloud forms over the area. Tonight, I sit here, happily, listening to the sound of rain as it hits our awnings. It is wonderful to hear. And, like so many other things it triggers memories. I thought, after going off in my last post I might take a lighter approach today and meander through the part of my brain that is the past.

I love rain for so many reasons. There is something calming about if for me – even in the strongest down pour. I remember being in San Angelo, Texas for technical training school. They say that everything is bigger in Texas. The rain storms I saw in that state lived up to the motto. I cannot count the number of times I would be sitting in my room with the door open and not be able to see the parking lot five feet away. I would walk out into the rain only to have to get back under the cover due the pain when hit by the speed of the drops approaching earth. To add to these great bucket fillers, these storms also produce some of the most magnificent lightening every seen by these eyes. You could feel the hair stand up on the back of your neck. Texas really knew how to put on a light show.

While Texas may have impressed me with the force of its storms, England did the same but with the amount of rain that I saw. I remember first coming into the country. At one of our briefings, we were told that we should not put off plans due to rain. “If you plan something, do it for if you put off things due to rain, you will never do it.”

Now contrary to the standard image, it does not rain every day over in the United Kingdom. It is gloomy a good number of days, but the summers were normally beautiful and sunny. That is unless you were at Boy Scout Camp. As a senior staff member, if it rained, you walked the grounds to check and make sure tents weren’t flooding and campers were above water. I do mean above water – some camps had moats surrounding them. One year, we had scouts walk one behind the other just so the person behind could pull out the sneaker that got stuck in the mud of the scouter in front. I would like to say in my seven years of camp that this happened once – nope. I think it was a little over 50%. The years I was Scoutmaster and staff made for a very tiring week. I will admit it was cute when we found some campers under the kitchen rain fly because their tent had gotten wet. We flashed the lights in the area of the filled sleeping bags only to find little eyes near the feet. Two hedgehogs had taken cover under the end of the sleeping bags.

The worst experience had to be the last year I did double duty as Scoutmaster and aquatics staff. I went back with the troop at dinner time. During the meal the rain finally let up enough for the boys to start a fire. We sat around doing the Norman Rockwell thing roasting marshmallows and telling stories. The one thing my boys could brag about was the fact that I knew a ton of ghost stories. They begged for stories, one after another. Finally, with a voice almost gone, I sent them off to their tents. Later, after redoing KP, I found my tent.

Now when we were camping, I slept with one ear open. If something moved in camp I knew it. It wasn’t long before I heard a sound. Not movement. It came again. I couldn’t quite make it out. One the third time, I realized it sounded like my name being called. I crawled out of my tent in shorts, t-shirt, and sandals (my shoes were drying somewhere). I walked across our site from the parent side to the boys. One of the boys was upset, not quite in tears. I asked what was wrong and the returned reply was that he was worried after my stories. I explained they were stories. He asked if I would stay outside his tent for a while until he fell asleep. I found a piece of cardboard to sit on. It sunk in the mud. I reassured him that no ghosts would get him (I shouldn’t have sold the camp ghost so well the year before). We talked through his tent for a while. He fell off to sleep, or so I thought. For the next hour and a half (or more), every time I rose to leave he asked where I was going. The rain started again. Light at first and then more consistent. I sat there. After a while, I heard snoring. I crawled back to my tent. Morning came much too soon.

The last memory comes from when I was a kid. Our family used to go tent camping in the ‘70s. This meant we had a huge, canvas tent. We loved it. I really loved when it rained because I could smell the canvas. There is something about that smell. I guess I was destined to be in the armed services. The last tent trip I can remember involved a rain storm. Our neighbors used to camp with us. It was one of their friends or relatives that came in with a motor home. When the rains started they threw all of the kids in our family-sized tent, and the parents went to the motor home.

The kids were all coloring, reading, or playing board games while the rains came tumbling down. The one thing my brothers and I, along with our neighbors, knew was to stay away from the sides of the tent when it rained. Our parents taught us well. However, the visitors did not know this. At one point, one of these young people found out that if you touched the canvas, the rain came in. They started writing on the tent, watching the water follow their fingers. The more they wrote, the more water came into the tent. By the time any of us realized what they were doing, it was too late. We had Niagara Falls (okay this is the memory of a little kid) flowing down the walls of the tent. We called for our parents. However, either in the haste of my dad trying to get in to strangle these kids, or due to those kids going in and out of the tent a bazillion times – the zipper was stuck. My father struggled while the tent flooded. After that trip, my dad bought our first trailer.

Rain is wonderful. Rain is fun. Rain is what we need out here. So I am happy to sit on nights like this and listen to the sweet pitter patter of the rain.

Thank you for meandering with me.