I played in the rain today.

The white-noise symphony of a billion droplets quenching the earth had lasted throughout the afternoon. We gazed out of our open windows at nature’s catharsis, and I felt that I too needed cleansing.

Let’s play in the rain, she says.

We walk out of the door and onto the steps. The noise that had filtered into our apartment surrounds me, becoming a part of me, transporting me from the cocoon of our appropriate place and into something shamelessly real.

Simply knowing becomes feeling, hearing, experiencing as the cold droplets patter my skin upon a hundred places at once, my hair transforming from a mop of curls into dripping, drooping tendrils.

The appropriate homes down the street stay appropriately dormant as their occupants sit nestled by the appropriate fires, the rain happening like a gray afterthought. The very rain that is sensually overwhelming me.

Yes. Let’s play in the rain.

I want to experience the rain.