As of July 8, 2013 Atlanta has had the rainest year on record. We’ve already had more rain than we had during all of 2012. It’s been raining almost everyday for weeks. And rain is predicted for the rest of this week. The drought is definitely over, for now anyway.
This was written by my daughter Ayanna after our move from rural Mississippi to the small city of Excelsior Springs, MO. She was about 8 and it was 1984. An edited version appears below.
Ayanna Ayanna
I would like it to stop raining.
I have to do my route in it.
School shorter and no home work.
There’s not enough time in 24 hours for 6 hours of school and homework.
Move back to Mississippi.
I know more people there.
get more money on my route a week.
I have 43 newspapers and get paid only $10.
have summer longer
you can do more, like swimming.
Weather is a great connector isn’t it. Whatever the year, whatever the generation, whichever the continent, it is that daily exposure to what nature can throw at us that shapes our moods and directs our words. And what well directed words those were for one so young.
I especially like the second one – “there’s not enough time in 24 hours for 6 hours of school and homework.”
I don’t know how old your granddaughter, Kylett, is (lovely name, by the way), but that’s one heckuva big umbrella! Your driveway looks so pretty with all the trees. We used to live surrounded by tall pines & oaks & all. Now we’re up on a hill with only a few small trees – but the open view of the surrounding hills is fantastic, so I guess it’s a fair tradeoff. I do miss the trees, though.
It is a big umbrella. I used to love trees to until we moved here to Atlanta. Just about that time the drought that had been in effect for several years began to affect the trees. Since we’ve been here during the past 7 years two trees have fallen in our yard, missing the house, a tree limb has gone through our garage roof, a much larger one fell in the street. Four trees have fallen in the yards of immediate neighbors and another 4 further down the streets. These are huge oak trees. They just keel over. The roots come up, very shallow systems or sometimes limbs just fall off. The trees are green and look alive, then they just fall. If I’d known we were looking at houses that the trees were going to start coming down, I would have bought one of those with only small trees or big trees away from house and street.
We’ve been getting a lot of rain too, so what a timely SS prompt.
It’s really cute reading a young person’s writing when they’re trying to spell phonetically.
Thank goodness for spell check in the later years!
I sympathise with the lament about short days, although we’ve been having some beautiful sunny days interspersed with the winter rain and cold.
Think yourself lucky you don’t live in Sichuan !!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMAQVKAV-8I
A great rainy day wishlist. I agree about the not enough time in 24 hours line.
me too.
Nice post!
gem!
Wouldn’t it be nice if we got the amount of rain we needed and not too much or too little? The drought is still alive and well in Texas. The picture of your granddaughter walking in the rain looks inviting to me.
It looks inviting to me too. I like walking in a warm rain.
” There’s not enough time in 24 hours for 6 hours of school and homework.” Not many 8-year-olds could think and say those words. I like her line.
Hazel
It seems like there is either too much rain or not enough, especially this year.
Somehow I do not associate Atlanta with rain. Scotland has that reputation, but amazingly this year we have had very little, despite many grey cold days, and the garden is very dry. This past week we have had 7 days of glorious weather and as hot as I can remember for a very long time. I hope the sun and heat wend its way to you.
No heat! It’s been in the high 80s and feeling like the 90s with the humidity. It’s still gloomy and grey today. I’m glad you got some good weather!
i love the photo of your daughter with the very big umbrella. I also love her little rain poem/essay. Very cute.
The girl with the umbrella is my granddaughter while the poem was written by my daughter. Thirty or so years apart.
I remember when I was about 8 we had a 100 year rain that almost topped the river that was only about 3/4 mile from our house. We would drive the bridge over it and it seemed like you could just reach out and touch that raging water. My mother doesn’t remember the rain or the river, but I suppose to a 40 year old it was less remarkable.
When it rains like it did last year we complained; now after two weeks of very hot weather we are complaining again. We have two large sycamore tree in the gardens next to us – one is too close for comfort. Somehow I associated oaks as trees that survive for hundreds of years and not ones that just fall down. Your daughter’s poem was obviously expressing heartfelt emotions – does she remember it?
They say it was the 2 year drought that did it. She didn’t remember it. She has a horrible memory!
I’m slow to make the rounds this weekend, but I would award your photo and free form poetry as best-in-show for the Sepia Saturday theme! As for the wet weather, I’m getting tired of emptying the rain gauge!
The sun is shining here today, for a change. It’s wonderful. Thank you for the best-in-show 🙂
Great picture,
and the sentiment expressed in a child’s words,
priceless!!
I almost prefer the unedited version.
🙂
HUGZ
I do too.
A Politician who promised “Longer Summers” would get my vote ever time! What A Sweet Bit of Writing~working out the priorities!
I always liked fall. Unless I lived at or can go to the beach, then summer is great. Summers seem to be busier and here in Atlanta, usually too hot.