Monsoon

Rain poured out of thick, dark clouds and slammed into the dry earth below as the first of the summer storms rolled into town. Dry, dusty plains were quickly turning into rushing washes and small lakes in the wake of the torrential downpour.

Cassandra held her head high as she leaned against one of the wide wooden posts of the front porch. She drank in the sweet smells of the wet desert that swirled around her. She never thought wet dirt could smell so refreshing, but after an impossibly dry year, rain never smelled so luscious as it did now.

Humidity was thick in the air already, clinging to every fiber possible and weighing it down with moisture. Tiny rivers were now beginning to form and flow around in the front yard, quickly finding their way downhill to collect in washes. Cassandra could hear the flustered mooing of her families cattle being moved to shelter by her husband. The sound was quickly muted by a tremendous crack of thunder that chased down the bright flashes of lightening.

Nothing compared to summer storms, Cassandra noted. Their fierce beauty was something that simply could not be rivaled with. She thought they were like a small child’s temper tantrum- swift (one would hope), but terrible. One minute, the desert stood still in utter silence, quiet in anticipation. Then, it began to tremble in fear as the wind whispered and whooshed dust over and through the plains, valleys and peaks. Finally, a mighty storm cloud would appear and whisk across the plain, closer and closer. Soon, the grand mountains would disappear under a thick curtain of water. And before you knew it, thunder and lightening surrounded you, and then you were entrenched in a larger than life waterfall.

But, unlike a thundering waterfall, the clouds ran out of contents to dump on the earth fairly quickly, or would move on to another location. Soon the scorching sun would appear again, and then the desert came to life.

Cassandra found the desert fascinating and completely enthralling. When her husband first told her of Arizona five years ago, she laughed at him- until she found out that he was serious. Then she cried. Wept. Was utterly torn. She did not want to leave her comfortable home and family to find prospects of wealth and adventure in some forsaken, barren land as her husband longed to. Cassandra had only heard wild and vicious stories of how untamed the west was.

But that all changed when they finished their long, hard trek westward. Sure, it had taken some getting used to. The blistering heat in the summer was one of the hardest adjustments. Cassandra had found adventure though, and found such unique life here in the desert. It made her chuckle as she let her mind trace back over the first memories of coming to this strange land called the west.

The rain was still coming down, and Cassandra did not want to retreat into the house just yet. Instead, she drew the rocking chair up towards the front of the porch, just far enough so that the cool rains would mist across her sweaty brow. She slowly took her seat and began rocking back and forth methodically, letting all her senses be filled by the beautiful summer rain.

Her mind finally drifted back again to those memories of their great move, and her first grand adventure. Oh what trouble she had gotten herself into back then. That one day, the very first day in fact. Cassandra’s mind slipped back in time and recalled all the details to the forefront of her memory.

It had been a hot day, that first day she and her husband rolled into what would be their new home. A blistering, crippling hot day.