THE BEAUTY OF THE RAIN

Otago Witness, Issue 4029, 2 June 1931, Page 5

THE BEAUTY OF THE RAIN

By

G. Blyth.

(Special for the Otago Witness.) It was raining. Not the harsh biting lain that sends the world hurrying to shelter, but a soft grey blessing softly caressing as it fell. In sheer joy of living and love of Nature in her every mood I lifted my face and felt the cool wetness soothe my skin. As I did so I noticed a passer by throw a puzzled glance at me, then giving a hasty shrug he turned up his collar and moved awav as if in silent reproof of my apparent folly. I laughed, I could not resist it, the expression on his face was too obvious. It made me wonder then, how many of that thronging mass on the street cared anything for the beauty of the rain. I watched with interest in the lee of a friendly wall. It was nearly five o’clock, and the stream of life was already eddying from offices and shops. Men and women, boys and girls—a hurrying jostling crowd all eager to be away and escape all possible contact -with Nature’s refreshing hand. How inany of them had ever looked over a misty landscape when night was creeping up and that same rain -was falling, and seen the massing trees, leaves turning red, gold, and yellow—brown barky branches and all softly, shrouded with mist. Had they ever seen and loved a silver birch, each leaf a glistening elf dancing on slender dewy wings, or a rushing stream frothing over mossy stones as the drops pattered down, and the trout leaped till the surface of the pool whipped and rippled as it surged with latent life! ° Was a wet day to these city dwellers nothing but an occasion, on which to don some new style of dress—to become the “dernier cri” in rainy weather smartness? They passed the beauty by with blind impatient glance, and realised only with a sense of discomfort that it was “ wet.” Strange how a world of Nature’s people could pass this loveliness, for even here in the city the transfigured beauty caught at my imagination. Wet streets gleamed black with shimmering reflections of liquid gold and red from every blaze of illuminations. Lights flickered, faded, and reappeared. Small pools gathered, splashed suddenly in a shower of diamonds as a car passed, and formed again. My own home, and a rush of appreciation of my pretty windows with softly shaded lights glowing through blinds not yet drawn; that silver shower of drops ever falling, falling. A sudden vision of a leaping fire and comfortable slippers rose before me, and the spell was over. .But always I have the memory of that fleeting joy, and the swift realisation that beauty lies in everything, not least in the glorv of the rain.