Summer Storms
One year my family had a reunion hosted at our local campground. We had set up in the group site so everyone could be together and the spaces used for meals would be communal. My parents had set up their big green tent which houses six people, while my sister and I were in smaller tents. Think sort of like having our own bedrooms while camping.
We didn’t expect the rain. Several of us threw on ponchos and other rain gear, mostly the younger generation, and played in the rain as it fell. The older folks laughed at our antics and sat together under the large roof structure that was at the center of the site. A smaller pop up was set up to go over the grill so we could still have our meals and various card games started to make their way to the tables as entertainment when we were done for now playing in the puddles.
That night I fell asleep to the sound of rain dancing on the outer shell of my small tent. Rain has always been one of my favorite sounds. The drops of water hitting the roof, or colliding with the windows just to run down them, helps me fall asleep. There is even a rain noise maker app on my phone for when I am having a difficult time getting my mind and body to wined down at the end of the day. It put me into such a sound sleep that it took quite a racket to wake me.
My father woke my sister and I up in the middle of the night. I was startled awake by the entirety of my tent shaking, thanks to my dad who was doing his best to get through the sleep fog. He called to me through the roar of rain and thunder, trying to get me to be awake enough to understand my situation at the time. When I moved on my air mattress, the entire thing shifted across the bottom of the tent. This action startled more awareness into me. Deciding to truly test out what I had just felt, I poked at the floor in my tent. The water outside had gotten so deep that it waved back at me with ripples.
It was by that point that I understood that I had picked a low spot in the ground for my tent, and that pretty soon the water was going to be so high that it was going to start to pour in my zippered door. I quickly, or at least as fast as I could possibly half asleep and walking on water, got out of my tent and rushed through the rain that was hammering down with my dad to the tent that he shared with my mom. Inside, my mom and sister were waiting and trying to set up a spot that would be comfy enough for us to sleep through the rest of the night.
Dad pulled the stakes that anchored our tiny tents to the ground and tried his best to pull them to higher ground. Thankfully it was this action that made it so I didn’t have to spend the following day in the same pjs. We had to find a way to dry out some of the larger things because water has a way of being a pest, but for the most part we managed to find our way through the storm.
Those memories serve as great reminders for me. The warm glow of happy faces and laughter shows me that even when the world around you is trying to throw everything it has at you, trying to knock you down, you can still dance in the rain and count on those closest to you to come to your aid when it certainly looks bleak.
