“Listen to the pouring rain, listen to it fall

Its raining it’s pouring, the old man is snoring.”

My mother would croon this to me as I lay down to sleep. It was more pertinent when it was actually raining, but it didn’t matter to mum, she sang it every night.

Later she revealed, one day as we chatted about growing up, that I was such a difficult child to get to sleep she found it the only soothing thing she could to get me to sleep.

We lived out of town if you called our town a town. It was tiny place, a pub, a general store cum post office, a one-man police station and the school. Around it were scattered houses of various ages and disrepair.

My dad was the one policeman, and our house was about five kilometres out of town on what was called the city road. The city was a good two hours away, but our road led there, and I think it gave the locals a sense of connection to the big wide world.

Normally when it rained the gutters ran for a day or two then dried up. The river filled slightly, the dam above the town was refreshed and the landscape went quickly back to its drought status.

One year it rained for a week. The river rose, threatened to flood the town, and I remember dad being out all night as they watched the water rise afraid the water rose too high he’d have to organise evacuations.

For us kids though it gave us a new playground. There were puddles everywhere and muddy slopes to slide down. Our parents despaired, as we’d come home each day our clothes covered in mud or wet through.

Thankfully it only happened once in the time we lived there, but it gave us great memories. For my mum and dad though it left them with memories of trepidation as they imagined the disaster that potentially unfolded in front of them.

Sometimes at night now I sing that song to my kids as I settle them down at night.

“Listen to the pouring rain, listen to it fall

It’s raining it’s pouring, the old man is snoring.”

Written for: https://rachelpoli.com/2018/06/22/time-to-write-rain-creative-writing-prompt/