Let it Rain!

People here are very worried, the heat has become unbearable and we all keep praying for rain - what no one wants is a hurricane.

Wow! well, it is so hot here in the Yucatan that you could cook a hefty pot roast right out on the sidewalk in front of my house! I kid you not. It was just NOT this hot here last year, the year before, the year we moved here from Rosarito, (horrible place close to the border with California, town right south of Tijuana) it was pretty bad but I don't believe it was even this hot - at least it would rain in the afternoons almost every day. This puny rain, as I refer to it, did one of two things, either cool down the day some or, cause so much vapor you'd feel like you were in a lobster pot. This summer we are getting zero rain though every day rain is in the forecast.

I do not own a car, haven't now for about 2 years, decided I should literally walk my talk - about what cars do to the environment. The US uses over 18.5 million barrels of oil per day, = 777 million gallons to keep up with our gasoline demands etc.* but that is not this discussion...

I don't own a car and try to walk to as many places as I can or take public transportation. Today, it was so hot that I had to call this guy who works as a taxi with his own personal vehicle, to take me to all the various and sundry places I had to go. Wished I hadn't gone at all as I sweat so much it was embarrassing, and I am one who normally does not sweat hardly at all.

After my excursion, I am sitting at my computer with a fan turned on me and the computer - a fan is useless - just having the same hot air that's filling up this house blown all over me. Don't ask why I don't have air conditioning because that goes along with the same reason I don't own cars anymore.

Every last person who complains about the heat, who is native to this area says the same thing, I am praying for rain but not exaggerating. I don't want a hurricane coming our way. That is what Yucatecans have in the back of their minds. This is hurricane weather and it feels as though this heat is gearing up for a big one, and they are worried. The last hurricane to hit the Yucatan peninsula was in 2007 - hurricane Dean and every year as we enter hurricane season this is a real possibility.

At this point, the only thing I want is a big rainstorm that dumps lots and lots of rain on us without causing too much damage - like major flooding or other things associated with those kinds of storms. I had a dream once about making it rain and this poem came out of that:

rain dance

air deep
with desert
ancient sea
kissed hard
by eternal sun
and searing heat
new terracotta plain
that fruits
only primeval
seaplant's perfume

barely showing
its teeth
the sun lingers
in the east
already hot
the road
stomped red
dustdevils
kick up furious
whirlwinds

rain my heart
lush prickly pear
palpitate amaranth
quench my spiny
nopal flesh
keeper of all
cloud's essence
dance here
on this ancient
ocean floor

let me plant
these lips
so that it might
rain before
my hand aims
skyward
flash of light
high in the blue
thunder beings
round dance

booming voices
chanting
in the east
in the south
in the west
in the north
from my shiny
steel bucket
I splash water
into the wind

drink flowers
drink earth
drink creatures
drink sky

rain
in big drops
dance
in big drops
breathe
the big life

© Odilia Galván Rodríguez, 1990

and of course no one is going to believe this because I hardly do, but as I was writing this blog, it started to thunder...

I wasn't that impressed since it does that a lot around here and it doesn't end up meaning rain, just a little coughing by the power(s) that be. But, as I was copying the poem into the piece and reading it over - it started to rain! Rain in big, big drops, yes RAIN!