The Devil Beating His Wife

It rained today. The sky wasn't particularly sunny or cloudy, but the thunder started around 17:30. As I worked intently on my new ceramics project, I heard the muffled sounds of Chilean thunder (or truenos). Several people in class moaned at the sounds of thunder and pittle pattle on the roof, but I continued shaping my clay in an over-tired creative trance, as if nothing were happening.

Unlike every other day in ceramics class, I was the last student to leave. Normally I leave with my Tufts friend, Emily - after the California kids and before the Chilean kids. But today I slowly cleaned up my spot as if to avoid the down pour that was now banging on the roof. As I washed some tools, I smelled the familiar smell of summer rain in Cali, Colombia. That ever so slight whiff of my past awakened the nostalgia that seems (now more than ever) to grow like weeds - like dandelions - in the spaces between cemented thoughts.

And so, led by memories, I said bye the Professor, and headed into the rain. I walked quickly through the almond sized raindrops, and though disappointed by the lack of familiar smells, I noticed that there was an unusual amount of golden light on the sidewalk. The sun was shining. Sun and rain? What a lovely juxtaposition in nature. My father (I think it was my father) once told me that if sun shines while it's raining, "the devil is beating his wife"... or so they say. "They" being those who believe in the devil, and beatings, and wives.