Ramble in Rain

Ramble in Rain

By: Red

Pitter Patter

Splish Splash

Raindrops have a magic in them that seduce our conscience, nabbing it to a plane of thinking a step higher than we are normally induced to feel comfortable with.

Lulled into deeper thinking, the rhythmic thud on the window bangs on our soul with questions that never have answers.

Perhaps that’s why many of us find rain unpleasant. Taught to value efficiency and efficacy, contemplating on unanswerable questions seem pointless. The inability to arrive to an answer shows weakness in man and engenders incompetency.

But we often overlook that it is weakness in nature that creates strength.

Like how only the most imperfect of stone pagodas* survive the current of rain and time, the pursuit of perfection often leads us to failure.

In the beginning, when Adam wanted to become “like God,” perfect, the original sin, humanity suffered the domination of death, ignorance, and an inclination to sin.

When Napoleon desired control over the entirety of Europe and to build an empire more grandiose than ever, his hasty desire for perfection led to his downfall.

Perhaps humans are no different from the stone pagodas that have survived in temples for centuries. It is only those that accept their flaws and make themselves of it that succeed for long.

“Life is not always a matter of holding good cards, but sometimes playing a poor hand well.” Jack London

Our desire to hold good cards all the time —a desire for perfection— is essentially an insatiable greed that cannot be fulfilled.

Growing up, we’ve all listened on countless occasions to the story of the three little pigs and the wolf. The story follows the progression of three pigs and how they each prepared themselves for the danger of the wolf. The first pig, lazy, builds a structure of straw. The second pig, lazy, but a bit more aware builds a structure of sticks. The last pig, taking his time, builds a structure of bricks. The moral of the story is supposedly that hard work and dedication pay off. However, living life, we learn that those who are most paid off for their work aren’t those that do their best in everything. Rather, it is those who know how to best ration their efforts in places and times that matter.

Society teaches us to be the second pig: wolves can’t blow apart wooden structures, stick or not.

Even when it comes to meeting new people, people who are like newly built shiny stone pagodas feel unrealistic, inhumane. It is those who have scars of time on feeble hearts and marks of tears on worn fingers that we relate to and empathize with.

Wish

Wash

The sound of the passing car wipers nabs me away to a new plane headed for Greece.

Thinking of Greece, I’m first reminded of hummus and second Socrates.

But looking up hummus, apparently hummus originated from the Middle East and not Greece.

So apparently the only thing Greece reminds me of is now Socrates.

Thinking of Socrates, I wonder what a modern day Socrates would be like.

Would he be mistaken for eighth graders syndrome and be placed in a ward?

Were all philosophers just adults with an extended case of eighth graders syndrome?

Did eighth graders syndrome change the world?

What of it now?

Spack a

speck speck

The light belting of rain on window blows my conscience up up and away, all the way to space.

Cold. Dark. Empty. I cry out at the top of my nonexistent lungs, “GOD DO YOU EXIST?”

Sucking a deep breath to shout once more, I realize there’s nothing to suck in.

Plip

Plop

The waning rain throws me one last time through time.

It brings me back to the day I first confessed I liked someone.

Then to the day I first fought with my best friend.

The day I became strangers with said friend.

The day I befriended a new friend.

Became strangers with that friend.

The day I first faked a smile.

Then faked another smile.

The day I first faked love.

And finally faked me.

Faked myself.

Fake.

Me.

I.

The day the cycle repeated itself again and again and again.

God whispers, “Do you exist?”

Ever

So

softly

The rain pierces my limbs from finger to shoulder toe to waist. Like glass shards. Like spears of ice, freezing my bones from the inside out.

Dot a dot dot

I like the rain. I dislike the rain.

I love the rain. I hate the rain.

I tend to ramble in the rain.

*Stone Pagoda: referred to as 석탑 in Korean, this particular structure involves ordinary rocks being placed one on top of another in the shape of a temple. Commonly located in numerous numbers in front of temples, they are said to last centuries if made correctly.