OY! KRISTEN

It rained again yesterday.

I don't mind at all.

There's just something about a thunderous Georgia rain storm. It gives me goosebumps and eases my tension and calms me to the bone, all at once. I was born and raised here, so there's something intrinsically centering about the sopping mess of a rain storm that makes me feel at home; this sense of cleansing peace as the rain streams down the glass panes and rinses away the angst.

We are all from somewhere. Reactions to our regional weather come natural. I have friends who love a quiet Midwestern snow, some who crave the gentle gray rain in the Pacific Northwest, those who need the sun scorch of the coast like they need the beat of their own heart. For me, I settle into a calm stupor when the weighty clouds commune overhead, seeping with humidity, toiling with the strangely lovely and very telltale scent of rain, gathering and commiserating until finally sacrificing the forceful system down into the earth. Pummeling with lightening and thunder and sheets of unforgiving rain, I am undone.

It never fails to mesmerize, this simple bit of weather. There isn't another place where the rain is quite like this. I've grown to love it, to cuddle up under a blanket and close my eyes and listen. To walk out on the front porch and share the moment with my little son. He is rapidly learning why the rain matters, both to the garden in the back yard and to mommy.