Day 6: Miami Rain

In Miami, when it rains, it pours. And when it pours, it thunders. And lightnings. (Is lightnings a verb?) And when it’s raining and pouring and there’s thunder and lightning, you can almost always see sunny skies somewhere in the horizon.

Today it started to thunder at the end of rehearsal. We were debriefing what went well — the mics were not nearly as chaotic as we’d anticipated, the students who’d forgotten some of their lines yesterday had clearly practiced, and the dance is getting better except for a few who are going in the wrong direction — and what we still needed to work on — having all props and set pieces ready to go before each skit starts, making sure the mics are away from our faces so that we don’t sound like Darth Vader — when the girls squealed.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” E said. “That lightning was just SO long.”

As we packed up and headed to dismissal, I looked at the impending gray clouds and thought, “I hope it doesn’t rain on our walk home.”

Twenty minutes later, during a make-up parent-teacher conference with R, the thunder got louder, and the rain was just starting.

“I love this weather,” she said. “No soccer today!”

“I love this weather too,” I agreed, “but at home in cozy PJs, not here in the school!”

As our conference ended, the sun was coming out to the west.

“Oh man,” R said. “But whatever — no soccer!”

“Miami is so weird,” Kim said. (We’re both New York transplants.)

We walked home together in the rain, both of our umbrellas blowing in the wind, getting wet in spite of their coverage, giggling and speed-walking. After we parted ways, a car splashed water on my jeans. Great.

Once I got home, I kicked off my Dr Martens and peeled off the wet jeans. The view from my balcony showed the rain stopping and a God-like sun shining through the clouds, as P often says.

There’s a lesson here, I suppose. Something corny about how every storm is followed by the sun. How through all the tough of this year, I’ve found so much happiness too.

Or maybe it’s just that Miami rain is weird and you’re bound to get wet, no matter what.