It must have been the early 2000’s. I was a child, though there was some debate around that. I was accused of behaving maturely for my years (like it was a choice!). There was certainly a child in our home- my younger brother, who usurped all the privileges of being one. I should have known; he was never a sharer after all. Our family had one washroom, so naturally, I, the responsible girl, would wake up early to use it and give him the chance to sleep a bit longer.
That day, I woke up feeling like I always did about school days: fearful of being slapped, humiliated, or scolded by the teachers; stressed about the possibility that I had forgotten about some piece of homework or some test; and lonely, a feeling not specific to school but heightened by it. Today another feeling accompanied all these, an awkward glee; awkward because it must have felt at odds with me and my day. We never got a chance to get well-acquainted—me an unplanned happiness. I had woken up to rain.
It had been raining for a few days; the sound of rain accompanied by thunder, pattering over the roof, was a delight; so was the Gothic tone of the morning and the muted light of this dark, stormy day. On the other hand, my mother was visibly and audibly annoyed by the rains. She had her reasons; she feared the drain outside the house would overflow, and just like everything else, she would have to take care of it. I could empathize with my mother, but I also couldn’t help but smile at the rain while my mother bellowed in the background about it.
To know my mother was upset required acute observation; she would keep talking about it loudly for the whole house to hear—one that had adapted to ignore her—and she also employed the use of the sound of banging utensils to drive the point. You see over the years, she had tried talking, then talking loudly, then shouting, then persistent shouting, and now just being loud with everything. While I had learned to walk like a cat, my mother had learned to screech like one. It was remarkable how much sound she could make in both intensity and variety. Even her picking up blankets in the morning made a sound. Curiously enough, my silence and her noise both remained unheard.
I crawled up the chest of clothes that rested against the wall with a small screened window over which we kept quilts to watch the rain for a minute or two. Fully aware that I needed to be in the bath before my mother called for me again, I gawked at the rain, trying to get a better view by clearing the crust of the night from my eyes and the fog off the window.
The rain was beautiful. It poured heavily; the winds made furling curtains out of the drapery of droplets. The green of the plants was greener against the grey-cast sky. It was rather odd how much the thunder sounded like it did in old movies; there was no dearth of the dramatic. White clouds and fog had cushioned the mountains. The rain and its entire retinue had artfully smudged the surroundings; the only precise and stark thing was—the lightning.
The quilts were softer and cozier, my toes disappeared into a sunken softness. In that moment, watching the rain, I felt I belonged right there—to that moment.
Well, my moment was brief—it was time for school.
Mother wrapped me up in an old, shabby-looking raincoat instead of handing me a cool umbrella (Yes, umbrellas were cool, I can’t explain why, they just were). Besides, raincoats weren’t ideal for bus travel; you could not store that wet tarp anywhere, and you sure as hell would not be wearing it on the bus. Raincoats made an already stressful bus ride even more stressful.
It’s not as if I was ever excited about school, but that day, I detested the idea of going so much that I bawled in the bath and then teared up at the bus stop. Our bus would always be filled with school kids like they were stuffing; the more, the better. Like with any bus, the side opposite the driver usually has more seats, which is why, perhaps, it would always tilt to that side. School bags were stacked one over the other on the seat behind the driver, while the students were stacked laterally. By the time it reached my place, there was no seating space left.
I saw the dreadful vehicle approaching from far away and my heart sank. It halted at its usual spots. It was advancing faster than usual—all terrible things do—I thought to myself. As it came closer, I noticed it was not tilted! Then, I saw it was empty—what was going on?
The bus halted, and the conductor shouted: “School is shut for today, heavy rains!”
If I weren’t an introvert, I would have danced right there however, I did wiggle my toes; I was happy. Such things never happen. I didn’t even hope for it; I always hoped for an earthquake to shut down the school.
When I returned home hopping cheerily in my dreary raincoat, looking like a penguin. It had grown even darker so, the houses were lighted up. The warm glow of the light from my house reflected off my drenched raincoat; it was not too shabby at the moment. My house looked cozy and welcoming.
I quickly changed out of my uniform and sat in front of the window over the quilts to watch the rain. My lunchbox was still warm. While I warmed some milk for myself in which I had discreetly smuggled some tea dust (kids were not allowed to drink tea), my tiffin was kept cozy under the layers of the blankets. This way I arranged a dainty picnic just for me. Till date that happens to be one the best lunches I had (in the morning, of course).
From that day on, I fell more in love with the rain. When it rained, I could just be, I wasn’t expected to brave through the day or feel guilty for not being able to do that. When it rained—I was home.
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