it's raining. hard. hard rain like a good southern storm and i'm missing my good old southern porch from where i often watched the rain. rain here seems to get everything wet- even porches. but because it's monday morning, i'm not at home, but on the road taking little people to school. i drove slowly watching streams of orange brown muddy water add to the activity on the road- another obstacle- people, bota's, matatus, trucks, goats, bikes, potholes and now streams. it's like the next level up on the video game of kampala driving.
of course when i left it was warm and cloudy but since i have a meeting, i threw on a summer dress and ran out the door- thankfully grabbing a little sweater, but not a raincoat, not an umbrella, and worst of all... not my new rain boots. let me pause and share my story about the rain boots.
a few years ago, we adopted our dog clover from the atlanta humane society.
it was the 'rainy season' in atlanta- somewhere between winter and spring- it was march. it rained everyday. hard rain. the yard was muddy, the sidewalk puddled, and clover was not trained. clover needed to go outside and go to the bathroom- often. we had planned to build a fence
before getting a dog- but it had been winter and the ground was too hard to dig out the post areas. we could have waited- but zoe was struggling and i was convinced that having an animal friend would help- and so i made the deal with mike that if we got the dog before the fence was up- it would be my job to take her out- rain or shine- early or late. now you can tell how desperate i must have been- and how deeply i'd convinced myself that a dog would help her.
after we'd had clover for a week- i realized i was having a shoe dilemma. i needed rain boots. now, i'm not a great planner. i tend to purchase when needed- not just in case- or even, not before the obvious need arises. like rain gear. pretty much anywhere i've ever lived- there have been very rainy seasons- but somehow, perhaps out of denial, i never have the appropriate gear for me or my family. in fact i think about rain gear as something i'd like to get away with
not having. and maybe this is where
my sensory issues come in. raincoats are cold, in a clammy sort of way. and they stay wet. and so do umbrellas- and i don't like the way they look generally. so my kids never have rain coats- they never have umbrellas- and only one year did they have rain boots that fit them (and they'd begged for them). all the other children in the neighborhood walk to school in matching aquatic animal themed rain gear, frogs, ducks, dolphins, etc. and their moms this year had on some very cute, very patterned rain boots. i'm always the lady run,skip, jumping to avoid large puddles and low hanging wet branches- while pulling the kids behind me- and getting annoyed that i'm getting wet- as if i should be surprised.
so now that clover had presented a need for rainboots- i set out to find some cute ones. but i couldn't. they were all gone. bought up by those prepared mothers. target was out. the mall was out. it was one of those typical situations where something is only
not available when you finally need it- but before, you couldn't figure out why they'd stocked so many flowered rubber boots. anyway, i finally ended up at a department store trying on a fabulous pair of pumpkin colored hunter boots. these are the old english wellies but in new funky colors. they are well made, and they actually
fit (vs the typical boots that have enough room in the calf for your snow pants and your other leg). i loved them, but. they were crazy expensive. they were twice the price of the adoption fee we'd paid for the dog. so i began to go down that path of mental tricks that i often use make decisions about whether or not to buy something- but that rarely results in a decision other than the one i'd made the moment i became aware of my ethical spending crisis. the mental games include: 'the cost divided by how many times will i wear this item'- so if i wear these boots to walk clover 100x (over the next month- which is a little more than 3 walks per day) it will cost me only $1 per wearing! but that didn't work because they still cost $100- and i just couldn't do it. so after walking around the shoe department in those glorious boots, doing my calculations for about 30 minutes, i left empty handed and drove to a hardware store and bought a too-big-but-sufficient pair of small men's rubber boots for $10 and felt that i'd made the right choice.
and they were fine. they weren't cute and they were too big, but i had dry feet which i believe is the point of rain boots.
when we were packing to move to africa i didn't have room for the boots- and thought that was fine as i couldn't recall many rainy days when visiting before. but we landed at the beginning of the rainy season, and pretty soon i was back to my spastic pinball walk to avoid puddles and mud (which of course is impossible when you are walking on unpaved paths).
i began to have intrusive thoughts about those pumpkin boots.
i began to obsess about how i could get myself some pumpkin hunter boots.
so when we had power and internet- i was on line looking for them. well, it was two years ago, so pumpkin is no longer 'a color'.
there is always ebay- but apparently no one wants to part with there pumpkin size 8 hunter boots. and i can say that for a fact because i checked craigslist in
every city in the US and england. this is an embarrassing fact about my personality, i have a slightly obsessive side. but when i realized that there were no pumpkin boots in my future, i let it go. okay, i let go of the pumpkin part.
my parents arrived last week heavy laden with gifts and 'necessities'. peanut butter, chocolate chips, batteries, rain coats for the boys, and an early birthday gift for me. they brought me size 8 hunter boots in plum. and they are beautiful. they know me. they give good gifts. they even brought a pair of fleece socks that match to avoid the cold clammy rubber feeling. above and beyond.
today would have been perfect- today would have been a fabulous rain boot day. i could have put those boots to good use, i could have been a vision in plum.
but now i'm home. and as often happens, even during the rainy season, it's become a beautiful sunny day. the sky is blue, the dirt has dried, the puddles are gone. until next time- i'm hoping, tomorrow.
