lago miraflores

There wasn’t any warning.

Maybe the wind slightly picked up, whipping the pages of my notebook as though trying to hurry me through my work, maybe the clouds turned a slightly sinister shade of gray, sneering at the sun as they thickened, maybe I had to move from the balcony to finish a phone call because I felt the smattering of rain drops. But it was the dry season, is the dry season, will be the dry season until May. So dry that the water only gets turned on twice a week. So dry that whatever little bit of moisture my body manages to drink in, I sweat out.

Then the sky opened up. To heck with the dry season, mother nature says, bring on the rain.

Rain pounded on the rusty tin roof. Deafening and without mercy. It took me about 30 seconds to realize what was going on, my first thought being, logically of course, that we were under attack. “Oh my god it’s the Russians!!”

“What is going on over there, a stampede??!” asked the club president I was on a Skype call with at the time.

“Oh, nothing, it’s just a little rain in Honduras.”

The balcony was deserted, my sunshine haven battered and defeated, the braided hammock, once a symbol of breezy relaxation now heavy with water and storm, a damp reminder of sunny days past. Sheet and sheet thundered down in torrents. Only one thing to do with rain like this-play in it.

People are look as us like we are crazy gringas anyway, so why not reinforce the image. Like animals let loose from a cage (we really do live in a cage, bars and wire and all—pictures to come), screaming banshees dressed in rompers and tanks and sandals set free upon the earth. Wading through muddy rapids up to our calves, dancing and whooping and embracing it all. The boulevard was flooded, the river grew strong with currents that could sweep me away. The rain was so intense you couldn’t see, couldn’t open your eyes. We ran, we stopped, I stood looking up at the sky, laughing uncontrollably because this is my life. What is it about playing in the rain that is so liberating? The act of spontaneity, the child-like wonder and awe at the power of nature, the refreshing feeling of water against skin, the metaphoric cleansing, the release of inhibition—all sheer joy in one of its purest forms.

Chicas locas, laughed the Honduran staff. Crazy girls. An hour later, I wrung out my clothes as best I could, leaving a trail of footprints weaving through the house, and went to resume work, only to find a lake in our living room. Second floor living room, mind you.

Water had leaked through the tin roof, waterfalling and cascading down, flooding the room. For a couple minutes we just stood there, laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation, only in Honduras. Mopping it up with towels, we filled five buckets completely full of water. As we live in a neighborhood called Colonial Miraflores, we lovingly dubbed it Lago Miraflores.

God help us during rainy season.