Rain is Beautiful, by Erin Russell

Prof. Jenkins reminded us that rain is beautiful—which I knew could be true—but I still waited hopelessly for the sun to break all week to trek to White Clay Creek. It soon was Sunday, and I woke to the sound of rain. With a bit of forced enthusiasm, I drove through the soggy campus until I hit the woods. As a Parks & Recreation vehicle drove by, I momentarily worried about getting a parking ticket, as I have experienced firsthand Newark’s relentlessness in distributing tickets. I reminded myself that even Newark Parking Services would refrain from ticketing whatever lunatic would be hanging out in the woods in the rain on a Sunday morning.

I already had My Place in mind: down the path to the right of the small parking lot that leads to the waterfall. I have been to White Clay enough to be familiar with the area, but not enough to walk down the correct path on the first try. After turning around once or twice, I eventually found the correct walkway. As I removed myself from the dry haven that was my Jeep Cherokee with nothing in hand but an umbrella, I found myself holding back a smile, which could have been from my satisfaction with stepping into muddy, ankle-deep puddles while wearing rain boots, or from the situational comedy of the biology-student-in-woods-on-a-stormy-Sunday case I found myself in.

I walked by a large, fenced in machine that I had never previously noticed on this path, and began to hear the roaring of the waterfall – I had found it. I passed a skinny tree decorated with white spray paint reading “RIP Pudgey,” and perched myself on a rock as close to the waterfall as I could get without falling in.

The water was higher than I had previously seen it at that same spot last April. It was brown and angry. Probably because it was raining. Or maybe because it was fifty degrees in February. Maybe because we had invaded its personal space years ago because humans needed big houses and supermarkets and toxic lawns that choke the water. Perhaps it was so angry because I had been neglecting it for so long, even though I call myself its advocate. The raindrops on the water’s surface made it twinkle like a mudded Milky Way, almost distracting me from the dead leaves being limply thrown into the frothy underbelly of the waterfall. A pointed log jutted up at the top of the fall, much like the upstroke of an Olympic swimmer’s arm. Still water swirled into a small extension of creek that leaked up towards the RIP Pudgey tree.

Containing the angry water on one side was a stone wall that met the bottom of a hill, atop of which was a house that overlooked My Place. Much like the one I saw walking in, the stone wall also had a large, fenced in, wildly out of place machine built on it. A haze engulfed the naked trees that lined the creek.

I almost forgot it was raining because I felt too tranquil, and was then reminded that rain itself is tranquil. In the city, I associate rain with unhappiness, frustration, inconvenience. At My Place, however, the rain seemed happy, peaceful, correct. I did not feel inconvenienced, and did not once worry about the preservation of my hair or shoes. As much as I did not want to come, I did not want to leave. I momentarily remembered my Real World responsibilities, only to realize that this is the real world. The world we constructed is fake –the upstroke log is real, the angry water is real, but highways are fake, big food industries that lie and deceive are fake. It sickens me to think that as someone so environmentally conscious, I am still so out of touch with the real Real World.

I passed the RIP Pudgey tree and the large, fenced in machine to return to my Jeep Cherokee. I did not receive a parking ticket.

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