Five minutes of non-stop rain

Everybody’s writing about the rains these days—the romance, the nostalgia, the slush, the slime and the devastation. When it started raining, at around 11 this morning, I rushed to the door—more for the chance to get wet in the shower than to salvage the laundry—only to be shooed back inside just as quickly. (Being seven months pregnant also means getting used to being denied quite a few of the good stuff in life.)

So my mother ran like mad, plucking near-dry clothes off the clothesline and rushed back into the house. She paused long enough to catch her breath, then turned and bolted the door only to realize that the rain had come down to a trickle and in another couple of minutes it stopped.

Bursting into a laugh Amma exclaimed: “Chey… ithenthoru mazhaya. Manushyane kaliyaakkunno?” (What a rain!!! It’s making a fool of us.)