I wanted to wait until it rained again before I wrote this article, but that does not seem to be happening any time soon. You’ve got to love a state that has drought conditions in this part and is flooding near Houston.
The last time we had a really good rain seemed like a couple of months ago. I remember it because it was the day and the exact hour that Goldie and I went for our daily walk.
I wasn’t singing. In fact I remember I must have had a scowl on my face. And Goldie was none too pleased either; she had her ears pinned back the whole way. That either means she’s really glad to see you (we get that a lot); she’s unsure about something or she’s really irritated about something. I leave it to you to figure out which one she was feeling at the time. But she was a good sport and didn’t object too much to a little rain along the way.
When we got to the post office, both of us soaked to the bone, a man with black hair and a pleasant smile said, “Out enjoying the rain, I see.” I chuckled a little and then said, “Yes. Yes, we’re enjoying the rain very much.”
On the way back home, with the mail already soaked, I got to thinking about one of my favorite movie songs of all time, “Singing in the Rain.” For a long time I thought the rest of the movie was a buildup to that song, but the more times I see it, the more I appreciate it as a whole.
For the longest time too I thought the song was about singing even though the conditions may not warrant such an exuberant declaration. What got Gene Kelly singing and dancing in the rain that day was love. He’s not really seeing the rain. All he sees is love. It’s a love too that frees him to give the umbrella he’s holding to another guy struggling through the same conditions.
When I was interim Pastor in Plainview, Texas, I knew a cotton farmer who was suffering through drought conditions much like we see here. It seems we struggle through drought a lot down here. As a hedge against a lack of rain, he had insurance so that if he couldn’t grow the cotton – and cotton needs a lot of rain to grow – they would be reimbursed for their loss. It also begs the question, “Why would you grow a crop you know needs a lot of rain in a place that’s prone to drought much of the year?”
So much of the time if we get caught in the rain, we treat it as a minor irritant, something to endure; certainly not something we can enjoy. But when I reflect on that time getting caught in the rain with my best pal Goldie, it made me appreciate it all the more.
When and if it happens again, I really will be singing in the rain because I know we all will be so thankful it’s back again. And you don’t need insurance against that!
Mark W Stoub is an award winning author of “Blood Under the Altar” and “The Fifth Trumpet: Fire in the Blood.” He certainly was singing in the rain after turning in his column and rains began to pour.
