Growing up, I always kind of hated the rain. In Seattle, it rained often— though, seriously, not as often as people joke about. On the whole, Seattle doesn’t get as much rain as, say, Miami if you are ranking in terms of total annual rain fall in inches. Seattlelikes to mist-rain.

But that is a whole other story.

The point is, I hated rain growing up. It ruined my plans to go outside and play in the woods and ride my bike around the neighborhood. Sure, at many points I kind of said “f–k it” and just went out in the rain. Late elementary, my best friend and I took to puddle hopping since the puddles in our neighborhood tended to reach a foot deep at times.

Can you imagine the splash that came off of those? I salivate at the thought.

By my senior year of high school, Hayley and I discovered we held a mutual rain-enjoyment in common: driving in the rain. Especially through puddles. No, we weren’t those jerks who purposely drove through puddles when pedestrians were around. We knew the best spots that had prime puddles that, after a few days of rain, were ripe for the drive-throughs. This tradition we kept up through high school, college, and up until I moved to Phoenix.

Upon moving to Arizona I quickly discovered that a) there was almost constant sunshine (which scared me) and b) people didn’t know how to f–king drive in the rain! When Mack and I first started exchanging emails it was something we laughed about in our emails: people’s inability to drive when it rained. Sure, Phoenix has shit for drainage and there are parking lots that will fill with over 6-feet of water. But seriously, people there will drive 5mph with their hazard lights and/or pull over to the side of the road and cry from the sheer horror of it all.

Mack and I? Yeah, we’d go racing! — I mean, drive responsibly through the rain soaked roads and see who could, within the law abiding speeds, get to the others apartment first. And no, we were never caught. Remember, I got my first speeding ticket here in Florida.

Whenever it rained in Phoenix, and now Jacksonville, Mack and I open the blinds in our apartment and thrive in the grey skies and drip-drop of the raindrops against the pavement outside. We adore loading up in his car and driving around watching people freaking out over WET STUFF FALLING FROM THE SKY! It’s totally amusing…

Until you want to go somewhere.

Mornings that I wake up and realize it is raining, I want to cry since I know what a headache my commute will be. People drive slow, have their lights on full-blast, and generally spazz as though they are the first people in humanity to experience this travesty against man-kind. WHY MUST YOU TOY WITH THEM SO?! I realize in Jacksonville, rain kind of dumps on your car as though you’re driving through a river or something but seriously? Driving in the rain isn’t brain surgery people.

It’s times like this I wish I had my Washington plates still on my car so people can follow me! Since I thrive in the rain fall.

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