I'm thirsty anyway

The rain comes down the mountains in audible sheets on a predictable schedule. Every morning a few moments shy of dawn a mounting leaf-percussion announces its approach just before it hits my windows.

There's probably nothing special about a rainy season like this for the rest of the world, but such a steady tropical bath is rare in Canada, even in muggy muggy Halifax. The last time I experienced anything like it, I was seven years-old and hanging in Jamaica. I never forgot it.

The steam from the monsoons has found a permanent home in my room now, and the temperature is making everything 'lush'. It's the word I'm using for everything. A 'lush' environment. Even my skin is lush. I'm getting a constant facial for free. But steam mixed with sweat is a sticky mess, a facial no one would pay for anyway.

What I can only guess are Asian cicadas screech in the new rain-forest plant rows that grew up in a blink behind my apartment - sounding one part like that slow-then-fast revolving front yard sprinkler we used to run from as kids (chch-chch-chch-chhhhhhhhhhhh), and one part like something non-human screaming a faraway scream at regular intervals. A few birdsongs I don't know throw harmonies into the soundscape. I wake up at 4am every day. Even at dawn my room is dark and dewy.

The bugs fly heavy in the moments the world surfaces, drawing in its deep breaths before it goes under again.

And under it goes.

"OK, the rain are cat and dog?"

"No, Mr. Kil, you're close though."

"It rains like cat and dog?"

"Even closer - it's raining cats and dogs."

"Raining cats and dogs!"

And thundering thunder and lightening lightening, like a strobe-lit bombastic pipe and drum band I can barely hear or see behind the curtain splash of a downpour that seems like it's coming up from under me.

Regular intervals, regular intervals, regular intervals.

Oh well, I say, bring it on.