Mirie it is...

(Anonymous, early 13th century)

Mirie it is while sumer y-last (Merry it is, while summer lasts)

With fugheles son (With bird songs)

Oc nu neheth windes blast (But now draws nigh the wind's blast)

And weder strong. (And strong weather.)

Ei, ei! What this nicht is long (Alas! How this night is long)

And ich with wel michel wrong (And I, with much wrong)

Soregh and murne and fast. (Must sorrow, mourn and fast.)

So it's official - one of the coolest and certainly wettest Sydney summer - if it could still be called that - on record, with only one day edging above 30degC in the 91 days that was supposedly summer, all thanks to the tempering effect of La Niña (see ENSO) (and we now sit on the cusp of what could be the heaviest rainfall New South Wales has seen in 125 years).

But I didn't mind one bit.

I love the rain. I love the slow prelude of heaviness in the air, that building up of stifling, windless, prickly, hot, humidity characterising the pregnant, heavy air preceding rain. One almost hears crickets.

And then it breaks. At first a trickle, then a steady patter, and then it arrives - it just pours, and pours, and pours, and pours, and pours.

It's simply atmospheric when it rains: the skies become dramatic, painted and stern with all shades of grey and billowy textures, together with the glimmer of lightning or the occasional peek of sunlight piercing heroically through the tough hide that is the heavens.

And oh the sound! I love the sound of rain - how it falls gently on grass, and splashes on leaves, and clatters on roof-tiles, and splats on glass-panes, and slow, wary traffic sloshing about on wet asphalt. The air comes alive with the whistling wind, sometimes screaming like banshees over rooftiles and stirring industrial-strength rattles making great avenues of shivering leaves, dancing with the waving arms of trees creaking, heaving, and tossing under the wind like a fiery flamenco dancer.

And the SMELL! The clean, clear, cold smell of fresh falling rain leaves one feeling washed, rejuvenated and fresh. Even the pungent geosmin of a brief shower falling on hot earth is enlivening; have you smelt the desert right after a rain? Incredible stuff.

Something about the rain makes people slow down, be more deliberate in their movement, more contemplative. It's fascinating stuff, this hypnotic rhythm of the drip-drops and splish-splashes, if it doesn't drive you batty.

And in an act of grace, the rain mutes out the noises of daily life and casts a lacy veil on everything around, making ugly things less ugly, and beautiful things more beautiful.

I love the rain.

[Trudge trudge, slosh slosh, splash, splash...]