Seventeen years ago, on the July 4th weekend, I drove back from a business trip to Atlanta. Took me all day, but it was worth it. On the day after I got home I met face-to-face, for the very first time, the woman who a little over a year later would become my wife. Our first meeting was at the Hard Rock Cafe. After the meal, we went to Rice Stadium to see The Eagles for their “Hell Freezes Over” concert.
Last night, there was a free concert at the Woodlands Pavilion. It was a tribute band playing the music of the Eagles backed by the Houston Symphony. We thought it was a fitting thing to do on the anniversary of that memorable first meeting. As we were driving to Market Street, where we had dinner reservations at a Japanese restaurant we’d never tried before, I saw some dark clouds in the sky. Because of the drought we’ve been experiencing this year, and the virtually nil chance of rain for the weekend, I dismissed them. The clouds had promised rain many times in past weeks and seldom delivered.
While we were eating, a little girl at a nearby table said, “Look, it’s raining.” And indeed it was. Not just a little shower, either. Torrential. And it didn’t let up, either. Accompanied by loud crashes of thunder and flashes of lightning. Thought the Woodlands Pavilion has a canopy over the seating area, much of the seating is on the uncovered hillside. We debated briefly what to do. As the rain continued, our decision became easy. We weren’t out anything—it was a free concert, after all. The thought of getting soaked on the way there (no umbrella was going to protect us from that downpour) and possibly having to sit on the hillside didn’t appeal to either of us, so we went home and watched some more episodes of Six Feet Under instead. The water on the streets was axle deep in places by the time we left the restaurant, and the rain, thunder and lightning continued for at least another 30 minutes. We didn’t regret our decision at all.
So, for perhaps the first time all year, we are ahead of our normal monthly accumulation of rainfall: over half an inch in some places, accompanied by strong winds that took down power lines in a nearby community. Still well behind on the annual accumulation, but July is off to a promising start.
Yesterday morning I did a full revision of the short story in progress, making major changes throughout. It’s up to 4700 words now. I’ll make another pass through it today and then try to start my next Cemetery Dance column, which is due this week. It’s been a long time since I had to submit one of those. Hope I remember how.
We’re into Season 4 of Six Feet Under. We watched at least six episodes of Season 3 on Friday night. Once a certain character went missing, we were hooked until we found out that character’s fate, though the information we had at the end of Season 3 was limited. Good to see James Cromwell join the cast. He always brings a calm, steadiness to anything he’s part of. Looks like this is Rico’s season to do stupid, stupid things.
