We are having a bona fide rain shower up here in Ojai this evening with real lightning and thunder! What an unexpected treat.

The rain is drumming a steady rhythm on the roof of the Airstream and every once in a while, there’s a flash of lightning and a peal of thunder. This is accompanied by the enthusiastic barks of Cordelia, our Welsh corgi, who may have some illusion that she’s been transported back to her native Wales where she is meant to splash in deep puddles and herd cattle and sheep in wet pastures. She has two little dogs to herd up here and some alpacas off in another enclosure, but since the alpacas are new, we have not had the nerve to see what might happen if Cordie decides to boss them around.

Now the “storm” seems to have passed. A mere ten minutes of rain that would barely cause anyone in my home region of North Central Texas to speed up their step. But we’re here in California, remember, where rain may be as scarce here as earthquakes in Texas.

And, of course, we need the rain. We always need the rain here, at least over the past too many years when drought has been the constant state of the region.

Humans and animals must instinctively know how critical rain is to sustaining life. I, much like Cordie, wanted to jump up and down and howl.

How else do you greet water from above that will wash off the dust on all the orange trees, wet the soil, and infuse the air with such sweetness?