Rain, rain, go away

Come again some other day

Come again some other day

I think I would not like to be in charge of scheduling rains to suit everybody. There seems to be no way to please everyone when it comes to distributing the rains. The rainfall seems always to be too much, or too little, or too early, or too late, or at an inconvenient time. I have had times when I was saying, "Let it rain anytime but now, anytime but right now!"

If I were in charge of rains, I'm afraid I couldn't get it right even to suit myself, let alone pleasing everybody.

Over the past several years, I have remarked at times that we seem rarely to have normal weather in northwest Arkansas. We have mostly weird weather. This year 2017 is no exception. We are having one of the wettest summers in recent memory. It is just not normal to have so much rain in August and to have our lawns still growing lush green grass and needing to be mowed every week. I always count on keeping my lawnmower parked for long periods this time of year. That plan isn't working this year. I have never understood the people who actually water their lawns so their grass grows even in late summer. To me, just as we used to "lay by" the cornfields for the dry late summers, so I always want to "lay by" my lawn and park my mower.

I once heard a story about how God was puzzling over the ways human beings were using the grasses he had made to cover his world. God was especially puzzled with how the human beings loved to cut grass. When it grew several inches tall around the people's houses they came out and cut it down and trimmed it all evenly. When it began to grow out again, out they came and trimmed it again. God gave times when the rains dried up and the grass turned brown, but then the people came out and watered the grass to keep it green and growing, so they could keep cutting it down. And God said, "What peculiar enjoyments my people have!"

We are hearing this weekend that Hurricane Harvey (or Tropical Storm Harvey) is bringing massive rainfall to the Houston and Beaumont, Texas, areas. Places that have never flooded are having rains measured in feet, rather than in inches. So many people are needing to be rescued that the first responders are overwhelmed, and officials are encouraging volunteers with boats or high-water vehicles to come in and help. I'm hearing that the storm will drop back off shore, probably to recharge, take on more moisture and power, and go on over to Louisiana to spread more rain. I'm wondering if we will get some of that extra rain here in Arkansas. My impression is that we really don't need it right now, and we'd rather just see it go away.

I'm remembering a trip to California which our family took in the summer of 1947. In those days, traveling by car in dry, arid country was more of a challenge than it is today. Automobile engine cooling systems in the earlier days were not nearly so efficient as they are today. Commonly, cars crossing the Arizona desert would carry canvas bags of water on their bumpers. That way, when your engine overheated, you could stop, let it cool down, and refill the radiator with fresh water and go on down the road. Hot and dry was the rule on that trip. I was 7 years old, and I helped my Dad manage the car by keeping a watch on the road behind us. When we were on an uphill climb, Dad would say, Jerry, the heat gauge is showing hot, you better start watching. So, when I saw water on the road, I'd tell Dad, "Dad, she's boiling over again!"

We would stop and let the old '37 Chevy cool down, refill the radiator, and off we would go again.

Apparently the summer of 1947 across the country was nothing like our summer of 2017. In the early summer of 1947, we had left my Grandpa Scott Nichols in charge of our farm while we made a long, two-month family trip to California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Wyoming, visiting relatives and seeing many places "out west." At the end of the trip I remember arriving home late in August to find nothing green and growing at all. Everything, everywhere, was dried up and brown. The garden was shriveled and dead. All the pastures were brown.

We had to start feeding hay to the cows early. That was one dry, dry summer. But, we really just regarded a dry summer to be a version of normal. It was usual, in late summer, for rains to go away, for Otter Creek to run dry, and for only a few of the larger springs up and down the creek to be putting out water. Usually the water from Morrison Spring on the north edge of Pea Ridge would not reach our farm two miles north. We depended greatly on the Spring at the Charles Day farm just north of us. I have hauled many a load of water from that spring, pulling a two-wheeled trailer with our Ford tractor, dipping water from the spring into 55-gallon barrels, and driving home slowly, trying not to splash the water out on the way. I have vivid memories of the summers of 1953 and 1954, with me and my tractor, my two-wheeled trailer, my bucket, and those 55-gallon barrels of water. It is still amazing to me how much water one milk cow can drink during a dry summer.

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Editor's note: Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is an award-winning columnist, a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history, member of the Pea Ridge Alumni Association and vice president of the Pea Ridge Historical Society. Opinions expressed are those of the writer. He can be contacted by email at joe369@century tel.net, or call 621-1621.

Editorial on 08/30/2017