Finding Momentum

I. When the rest­less­ness again enters my legs

We dare do what mere men dare not! We linger in the rain when moth­ers world­wide would frown, wag­ging their fin­gers at us chil­dren lol­ly­dal­ly­ing in the pud­dles, stomp­ing on muddy daisies, the rain soak­ing our pores. We run exclu­sively when it’s wet, through throngs of umbrel­laed passer­bys who cluck their tongues and shake their heads. And when it grows dark, we swim and splash through rivers run­ning in the streets, if only because we can, because we could, because we can. The rest­less­ness enters my legs when the sky begins to pour. We must rebel, we must run.

II. On the sen­sa­tion of rain

You can’t do any­thing to rain. It can only mess you up; it can only soak you. Have you ever heard the trees fight the rain? They try to hold the drops in their leaves; at night you can hear the cacoph­ony of each drop. The tor­rents will never cease, but the trees hold out their arms and try to drink the sky. It is the same with us (we can bat at one drop but ten more take its place). We can do noth­ing but steel our gaze, brace our bod­ies and drink the sky.

(There is a valiant euca­lyp­tus grove the length of Dwinelle.)

III. On fighting

Keep your heart rate up. Left foot, right foot, left. When you reach inter­sec­tions, jog in place. Blink often.

IV. The sender

10 As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
with­out water­ing the earth
and mak­ing it bud and flour­ish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accom­plish what I desire
and achieve the pur­pose for which I sent it.

V. Its effects

I return home, feel­ing unnat­u­rally lucid and com­pletely alive.