Laughing in the Rain

Brittany has a Fitbit and is SO into “getting her steps”. Every time I ask if she wants to go with me to walk the dog she immediately volunteers so she can get her steps in. Yesterday I even asked if she wanted to go to the grocery store and got the same response. Want to know something crazy? We walked 1.6 miles in the grocery store! I had no idea grocery shopping was such good exercise! It probably wouldn’t have been quite as good of a workout if I had made my list by area in the store. When we were in the milk section I noticed I had forgotten something in the produce section.  It was a hike and a half back to retrieve that item. I was impressed I actually had a list so the added “extra” steps were just a bonus.

Sunday afternoon I was heading out to walk the dog when again Brittany said … “wait, I want to go and get in my steps”.  I knew we needed to hurry to get in those steps because there was a big black cloud in the sky.  (If you are reading this and aren’t in Houston you should know there have been rain clouds for days on end.)  We got to a back road in our neighborhood when all of a sudden the sky opened up and rain began to pour down on us.  It was like a mini monsoon. Brittany, ever the athlete, kept walking from tree canopy to canopy and back just so she could continue “getting steps”.  I just stood under one tree and wondered how many mosquitos were going to bite me and hoped against hope that another tick didn’t jump on me (can I get an amen?!?).

While I was standing there I said “Brittany, I knew this walk was a bad idea”.

She immediately said … “It wasn’t a bad idea mom, this is funny”.

And, of course, she was right!  How could I have forgotten that quickly how fun it is to laugh in the rain?  It didn’t matter that our hair got wet or our clothes got drenched.  We were standing in the rain laughing.  What a gift, what fun!  When I shared this on Facebook a friend told me a similar thing had happened to she and her daughter on the first day of summer.  (I told you it’s been raining almost every day!)  She said as they ran home her daughter said “this is the best first adventure of summer ever!”.

Our story became even funnier to us after we called Bill and asked him to come and pick us up.  He was out doing “drive time” with Savannah which meant Savannah was driving.  They came and got us and as he got out of the car to come to the driver’s seat, Brittany slipped into the seat before he could so he, Gretel and I jumped in the back seat.  It looked like a Chinese fire drill was happening.  And trust me, you haven’t lived or laughed until you get in the back seat of a car with a stinky dog with your child driving the car.

As soon as we tracked in all the mud we could into the car and started towards home, the rain stopped.  Not a drop anywhere so we hopped out and continued to walk on our merry way.

So here’s to all the adventures of summer.  Here’s to enjoying the moment.

And don’t forget to laugh in the rain.