(A one-minute read)

My sleep was not disturbed by the dream so much as by an image from the past.

The rumbling. The muttering.

Glimpses of light, not quite seen, out of the corner of my eye. The midnight Midwestern vibration of thunder building, building, passing over and then through the house, something felt in the mattress, rattling the windows, vibrating me awake.

I opened my eyes and found that it was real.

A genuine thunderstorm in London is as rare as the blue moon, so it was a surprise to wake up re-living a late spring Minnesota night: humid, if not sultry, a steady downpour on the roof, counting four seconds between flash and boom, wondering where within the one mile radius that last stroke fell.

Rain drumming on the roof. It changes pitch with the changes in intensity, if I listen closely enough.

As a transplanted farm boy, rain remains the music of saturated air falling out of itself to water my pastures. For the sheep I once tended, it’s future food falling down. Chlorophyll from heaven. Money, dropping in a vertical line like long straight angel hair, tickling me awake and then blessing me back to deep, uninterrupted sleep.

Row crop farmers sometimes called these events a “million dollar rain.” I just call it an unexpected pleasure.