Last year, one crisp fall day not unlike today, Mrs. P and I were taking a not-quite-daily-enough walk in the park near home when something unusual happened, something I had not remembered ever experiencing.  

When we set out, we were quickly struck by the rare appearance of the sky, which had the look of a bright blue tonsure: the vast expanse of the sky was clear and azure, but the rim of the sky, just above the treetops in all directions, was covered by clouds.

As we were walking, though, something even more strange occurred: a few snowflakes, some tiny, errant crystals of water, drifted down from who knows where right in front of us.  

I can only imagine that the air in the upper atmosphere was so cold that what little water vapor there was froze. Either than, or these few flakes had come for the sky-monk’s fluffy rim and had drifted many, many miles to reach us. 

At any rate, this rare sight—snowfall from no clouds—transported me back to my childhood and the first time I’d ever seen the edge of a rainstorm.

It was one summer in Detroit, and a brief but strong shower passed over our street—but the rain fell only on one half of the street, stretching the length of our block and bisecting the street down the center nearly as neatly as lane markers.

Several of us ran to the middle of the street, stepping now into the rain and now out of it and again and again, reveling in the thought that we could be on the edge of something—that we could so easily experience both extremes—delighting in how an ordinary rainstorm could be so extraordinary.

In the years since then, of course, we’ve driven through the edges of many a rain shower, and even a snowfall, and felt the abrupt end of precipitation as though the spigot had been turned off. And intellectually, you know that each band of rain must have an end, an edge, a limit. 

But none of those later experiences, and none of that knowledge, can compare to that first time I saw and felt the marvel of the rain’s edge. 

Words © 2009 AtHome Pilgrim.

All Rights Reserved.