Rain

 Rain

If you've woken up in parts of England this morning you've probably noticed something. It does make frequent and, from time to time, fleeting visits to Blighty. Usually it comes in the form of heavy showers then develops into torrential downpours. Ladies and Gentlemen it's raining and, at the moment, it looks as though it's here for the day. But who cares? Let's just go with the flow.

Rain is like a charming old uncle, cousin or auntie who invariably jokes and laughs their way through the day at incompetent politicians or Hollywood celebrities who insist on having plastic surgery just to preserve their ego. We can never escape from any conversation relating to the British weather and then when we do we become obsessed with it, continually complaining about its inevitability and wondering whether it'll ever stop because we've just put the washing out on the line or clothes horse while then questioning the necessity to take out an umbrella to the theatre or open air concert. It has to be done otherwise we'll get soaked, saturated and we're bound to get a cold or some mysterious illness nobody has ever heard of. 

Rain though is British, quintessentially British, as synonymous with the United Kingdom as the Last Night of the Proms, red post boxes, lager and warm beer or so we're led to believe. Rain has been celebrated and immortalised in song and poetry, mordant humour, that agonising moment during a cricket Test match when the dark clouds subside and of course it stops play for goodness knows how long. But hey ho. No long lasting damage and harm has come our way and we can still get out the chess board  or Scrabble. Salvation is on its way.

We're still living and breathing, walking and talking and it has yet to have a detrimental impact on either our mental or physical health. It hasn't ruined our day because the likelihood is that in a couple of months, hot sunshine will burst through the clouds and we'll all feel infinitely better than we might have been because we knew it would brighten up quite noticeably. You'll see. It will. We know it does and judging by the meteorological patterns established over the last century or so the chances are that the rain will stop since it always has and always will. No need to panic.

You're reminded of the classical authors from the 20th century who simply couldn't get enough of the rain. William Somerset Maugham once wrote a beautiful short story about the rain and it was so poetic and simple that you were convinced even he knew when it was going to rain. George Orwell, Britain's greatest political commentator, social observer, essayist, novelist and controversial writer on the Spanish Civil War, referred to the fact that 'it always seemed to rain in Norway', which could never be proved conclusively because very few people could  measure its quantity during the Second World War. There were far more urgent issues to address.

But here in Britain we love to dwell on the frustrations that some of us may have to endure as a result of the rain. When are we going to get in the car  complete with picnic and hamper, laying out a sheet on a soft field of fresh green grass heated by the mid-day sun? So we stare out of the living room window mournfully and desperately, cursing under our breath quite audibly and then just watching the raindrops trickling down from the heavens as if it's definitely somebody's else fault and never ours. This evolves into a pointless blame game. You knew it was going to rain didn't you? You saw it on the weather forecast yesterday. Don't deny it.

So we all look up at the skies and rain becomes that self fulfilling prophecy. We knew it would rain and so it has. Then we resign ourselves to our fate. We simply throw up our hands in horror and spend the rest of the day fuming and seething. What's the point in going for a run or going for a long walk in the country with thick raincoats and hoods over our heads? It doesn't matter though. We've still got our health.

It then occurs to you that this whole gloom and doom narrative, this inherent pessimism which grips us whenever we see dark, glowering rain clouds, is just an excuse to tell us something we've known about for ages. It wasn't entirely unexpected. We are, after all, on the threshold of spring and you know what that means in April. We'll all be inundated with the wet staff. We can see it sweeping in from the Atlantic, thick clusters of mushroom coloured clouds with huge bands of rain about to crash down onto our pavements, veritable monsoons of rain that have just now taken up permanent residence in our neighbourhood.

But hold on. This is no end of the world scenario. This is not reminiscent of a scene of a disaster movie where the world and civilisation does quite literally come to an end. Rain is a temporary manifestation that will eventually pass sooner rather than later. We will keep Singing in the Rain because Gene Kelly, with that cute hat and umbrella, told us not to worry. The Move, a 1960s hippie, rock band sung about Flowers in the Rain almost welcoming the rain in all its glory and splendour. So of course rain has its redeeming features. 

So let's keep smiling and just be grateful for the rain because as somebody once reminded you rain is good for farmers agricultural harvest of crops. And of course most of us laughed uncontrollably whenever it used to rain heavily at Glastonbury, the yearly pop music concert venue in the middle of a field in Somerset. Years ago plucky and fearless Glastonbury concert regulars would turn up in their thousands, wellington boots and galoshes on their feet and acres of mud engulfing them right up to their ankles. Thick mud would accompany them every time they went out to buy food and drink and then growing in thick clumps inside their tightly secured tents.

It's time to just adjust our mindset and just recognise that rain is here for our foreseeable future and isn't about to go away anytime shortly. Winter, spring, summer and autumn will always witness varying amounts of rain in a quite arbitrary fashion whenever the mood takes it. So Ladies and Gentleman let's give rain the benefit of the doubt. Rain is our closest friend even if we don't think it is. We breathe a sigh of relief when a long, hot summer of droughts and hosepipes is broken by a good, old fashioned rainstorm complete with thunder and lightning. So let's hear it for the rain. It's good for the soul.