July 9, 2006
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Oh, how I wish it would rain down
So sang Phil Collins, but he hasn’t been living in Greater Denver this week, where it’s been raining every single day and pretty much continously since Friday. This phenomenon is beyond unusual; this is a semi-desert region. Coloradoans boast of our “300+ days of sunshine every year.” It’s a welcome change for me. I love the rain, personally. More accurately, I love the sound of it while I relax, warm and dry, indoors. Not that I mind walking or even playing in the rain– at least the misty or sprinkly varieties. I especially love when a thunderstorm rolls in, right before the first drops fall: the roar of wind, crack of thunder, that telltale smell in the air, the dark clouds casting a bluish pall upon the sky. I don’t especially care for getting caught, with no means of escape, with the floodgates of heaven are loosed and the deluge descends upon your unsuspecting head, fat, cold, stinging drops flung diagonal by the wind. Worse yet when followed by the meterological menace far too common here: hail. Frozen rocks from above pelting you, as if a rogue comet suddenly disintegrated in the stratosphere. Now, imagine all this happening while you have in your care an autistic seven-year-old boy who not only doesn’t comprehend what’s happening, but also doesn’t understand why you can’t get him out of it.
That was the situation we faced last Sunday as we left the Colorado Renaissance Festival. It was Maria’s birthday and we thought it would be great to take Caleb there, along with her mom, Caleb’s sister Dora, and her boyfriend, Ryan. We’d only been there about 90 minutes when the storm hit full-force. Along with hundreds of others, we scurried out of the festival gates– and then promptly were stopped, as we queued in line for the shuttlebus to take us to the upper parking “lot” (i.e. field– RenFest is out in the woods, literally). It was then that the hail hit. We taller folk huddled around Caleb to try to protect him, but he, unsurprisingly, quickly commenced a meltdown. Meanwhile, the $10 bag of cinnamon-glazed almonds we had just purchased were getting soaked in my hand, despite my best efforts at playing human umbrella. Eventually, we escaped and made the long drive home, drenched but relieved.
I felt bad that a literal damper fell on her birthday, but worse was yet to come. I don’t feel the need to reiterate it here, but you can read it all on Maria’s site. Now we are waiting for our insurance to be reinstated, so she can re-schedule her surgery. I’m still waiting to sign my contract. It’s been over a month now since I was offered (and accepted) the position, and three weeks since I attended the new hire orientation, and I’m still not updated in the system. Yes, I’m impatient.
