230711 noah

 July 11, 2023

The ridge stream in flood.

Is it ever going to stop? I am thinking about Noah and about forty days of this rain.

I love weather events. I realize that it is sometimes a disaster situation, and that is not good. But it is exciting to see nature unbound, caring not for frail humans, being wild. It reminds me that we are small and the world is big.

 I emptied my rain gauge at almost 100 mm; glad I did, because it would have over-flowed. That was after 16 hours. We received another 83 mm by this eleven this morning. Almost seven inches in thirty-six hours. 

         

This is not the normal rain we see in southern Ontario and Quebec. Even in Vancouver, it does not usually come down this hard for so long, though I have seen it rain for weeks on end there, just drizzling as if it's a permanent part of the air. England sees long days of such steady and heavy rain, hours and hours sometimes. ("If the sun don't come, you get a tan from standing in the English rain." - Lennon.) 

On the meadow,  water is tumbling down, willy-nilly, like children let out of school! I love how it races down and down, in such a rush to get to the river in the valley below, the Missisquoi. We are north of the river here, its valley is the one we look across towards Vermont.

This is not a stream, but rainwater following cowpaths, frantic and noisy!

The rain finding its way down the second meadow, west of the ridge:

The streams, usually trickling, are in flood. 

Fig's crossing, often dry enough to cross in shoes, is overflowing. The boards for crossing in wet weather are flooded over. 

Rocky, who does not like rain, lay on his blanket on the porch all day yesterday. I noticed that since there wasn't thunder, he didn't mind being out there all day. When I went for my walk to see the ridge, he came along, but when I crossed the stream, which for him would have meant getting very wet feet, he abandoned me and went home. 

Last night, the rain was so heavy, and the ground so sodden, that a stream formed across our lawn. It has already almost gone now though the lawn still has inches of water on it in places. But it doesn't take long for the earth to soak it up and gravity to pull it on down the hill.

At last the rain has stopped. The clouds are birthing again for the next rain.

I am wishing that those caught in floods may be safe. Be prudent if you are out and about in this! 

Mumma Yaga