it looks like rain for all of us

i went shopping for a vintage dress after work today (success!)
even though rain was imminent.
the deluge began shortly before i needed to hop
back on my bike and ride the dozen blocks home.
the gal at the store, herself a fellow biker, helped me
make a raincoat out of a garbage bag and off i went.

i've biked in sprinkling rain a number of times this spring,
which i love, but i realized during my ride home
that i hadn't biked in the pouring rain
since i was in scotland two years ago.

in our hostel in the port town of oban, on scotland's western coast,
my friend jennifer and i met two boys
who had been studying abroad in edinburgh.
they were from florida and australia,
school was over and they were doing some traveling
before returning home.
they invited us to bike with them the next day
on the isle of mull, a ferry ride to the west.

the day began with glorious sunshine but before long
the rain started falling and it didn't really stop.
scotland in mid-april is not warm,
especially when it's raining
and it was always raining.

i was wearing gloves, my down vest
and of course my raincoat
but i was still miserably cold.
poor jennifer didn't have a raincoat
and was soggy and freezing.
but we were determined to have a good time
and refused to give up and go back.
meeting other travelers had thus far proved
harder than we expected
and we didn't want to spend the day
wandering around drizzly little oban by ourselves,
although jenn did look at me once with
a glimpse of despair in her eyes and said,
"i don't know if i can do this."
but on we pressed and eventually
the rain became a sprinkle and
the sun found holes in the clouds
and peeked through to warm our chilly faces.

i stopped keeping a travel journal two weeks
into my five-week trip and i keep thinking
i need to sit down and write as much as i can still remember.
i've surely lost a few memories already
and i don't want to lose any more.

-nicole