Versions of this story now appear every couple of weeks in newspapers in California. This one comes from the SF Chronicle:
Thirsty California may get a smidgen of rain this coming week, but it is not likely to change what, so far, has been the driest calendar year in recorded history.
No rain at all fell in San Francisco in October and only 3.95 inches has fallen since Jan. 1, the smallest amount of precipitation to date since record keeping began 164 years ago, according to the National Weather Service.
Things can still change, but the storm predicted to roll in Monday and Tuesday has already petered out, according to forecasters, who are expecting only sprinkles, if that.
"It's absolutely dry," said Bob Benjamin, a National Weather Service forecaster. "We just went through October where there was no measurable precipitation in downtown San Francisco. That's only happened seven times since records started."
In SoCal native plants — even sages and ceanothus — are withering. It's been going on two years since the local stream ran for any length. Well water looks murky, and appears increasingly chancy,
Brings to mind a wonderful passage about the arrival of rain in Chinua Achebe's classic Things Fall Apart. Of course this is Africa, not California, but perhaps we can relate:
[from the Desert Research Institute's California Climate Archive]
Achebe [from chapter fourteen of Things Fall Apart]:
At last the rain came. It was sudden and tremendous. For two or three moons the sun had been gathering strength till it seemed to breathe a breath of fire on the earth. All the grass had long been scorched brown, and the sands felt like live coals to the feet. Evergreen trees wrote a dusty coat of brown. The birds were silenced in the forests, and the world lay panting under the live, vibrating heat. And then came the clap of thunder. It was an angry, metallic and thirsty clap, unlike the deep and liquid rumbling of the rainy season. A mighty wind arose and filled the air with dust. Palm trees swayed as the wind combed their leaves into flying crests like strange and fantastic coiffure.
When the rain finally came, it was in large, solid drops of frozen water which the people called "the nuts of the water of heaven." they were hard nad painful on the body as they fell, yet young people ran happily picking up the cold nuts and throwing them into their mouths to melt.
The earth came quickly to life and the birds in teh forest flutterled around and chirped merrily. A vague scent of life nad green vegetation was diffused in the air. As the rain began to fall more soberly and in smaller liquid drops, children sought for shelter, and all were happy, refreshed and thankful.
My form of a rain prayer, I guess.
Kit Stolz 