Green and Gray

The best thing one can do when it's raining is to let it rain.

(Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)

It is lush and green and fragrant out, but the sky is low and gray and has spat rain in intervals throughout the day. Duncan and I moped together on the couch, his head resting on my ankles while I alternated between finishing up a book––Thirteen Moons, a perfect gray day read, beautiful and melodious and as lyrical as the patter of raindrops against my windows––and knitting the blanket I foolishly vowed to have completed by the end of Summer. Neither of us could quite wake up or summon the energy to do much beyond eat breakfast and laze about. The rain, from our side of the windows, was a crushing way to end the long weekend, which has been as sweet as strawberry juice and busy, too. Figuring we'd both go insane with longing, we made the most of it and ventured out into the park to play in the mist, dampening our feet and chilling us only slightly. We played despite the wet, rolling in the grass and running, kicking up wakes of water as we passed. Duncan was not content until his ears were soaked and the hair on the tall point of his head stood up in spikes, until blades of grass had collected like a wreath in the chinks of his collar. My jeans were soaked and my hands pink and cold but it didn't matter because we'd found a way to enjoy the afternoon in our own pleasant way, splashing the puddles and smiling into the place where we knew the sun shone even though we could not see his face.