Waiting for the Water to Break

(Note: I don't mean to inundate y'all with blog posts, and I would wait a few weeks to post this if it wasn't so very much of this precise moment. Anyways... here goes.)

Today it was supposed to rain. I like rain. Don’t get me wrong, I hate being wet. I don’t like it when my feet are moist for weeks on end, the only reprieve from damp socks being my daily shower. But, I do like rain. Rain cleans things. It’s nature’s maid. Rain sweeps all the cigarette butts into the storm drains, and transfigures dust into clay. This city always looks best in the rain. Every surface is shiny. Everything glistens.  Hats come back in style, and umbrellas create little mobile pods of bearable sidewalk.  There’s more of an excuse to stay inside, turn up the heat, turn down the lights, cocoon. And, it was supposed to rain today.

It didn’t. There were sprinkles here and there, but instead of the heavy washing that this city so desperately needs, the entire day has been filled with regular upward glances at a dark grey sky, pregnant with torrent, but refusing to push.

In my house in the weeks before a new baby comes it’s like Christmas. Not the day, the season. And the Christmas season sucks. The Church ladies organize who will bring the meals for the first weeks with the same Machiavellian tenacity they employ in casting the nativity play.  The diapers are stacked by the bassinet with care in hopes that new life soon will be there.  There is a glorious, wonderful, miraculous thing. And it’s coming. It’s coming, it really is. Now, go help your father test the baby monitors. 

This city dies every summer. The grass goes away, and the tourists swarm like maggots over our overheated arterial routes. We live in a fever dream. Everything familiar dries up, and this city resembles itself the way a grape resembles a raisin. We stop taking vitamin D supplements. We sit outside on purpose, and we swim. In the Pacific Ocean. Like crazy people. This city loses its mind, its heart gets confused, and it dies.

When the baby is days away a certain kind of quiet settles in the house. It’s the quiet of a compressed spring; a cocked gun; a firecracker, wick lit. In these few days, emotions are closer to the surface. Little disruptions turn into World War Mom. Little absurdities produce giggling fits that last for an hour. Tears come easy. Every moment is overwhelming, but not quite real. The real thing is coming. So very soon.

When the fall comes, and the tourists leave, and the students come back, the city pauses and waits for the water to break. Who will we be this year? Will we band together over another Snowpocalypse? Will we find another reason to distrust our police? Will we finally admit that Portland is winning the great hipster war of the early 21st century? Our minds fill with expectant questions, and we begin to prepare. We close the flue. We put the storm windows back on. We bring the hats and coats out of the closet. Our ever-growing, beloved sweater collection once more sees the cloud-filtered light of day. We stop flirting with the various iced and blended coffee drinks and return to our staple lattés and americanos. We are waiting to be reborn in the rain.

It was supposed to happen today, but it didn’t. Maybe tomorrow.