“For the man sound in body and serene of mind there is no such thing as bad weather; every sky has its beauty, and storms which whip blood do but make it pulse more vigorously.” – George Gissing
The late afternoon rain at Lake Walcott was merely Mother Nature's preamble for the night ahead. -- Photo by Pat Bean
Travels With Maggie
Mother Nature threw a hissy fit last night.
She began the day with ominous clouds playing with the sun, blew up gusts of wind about midday that tumbled my bike and lawn chair about, then drizzled a little rain in the late afternoon here at Lake Walcott State Park in Southern Idaho.
All was merely a preamble to the thunderous symphony she had in store as night fell over the park’s lush green landscape.
Her daytime mood hardly bothered the birds at all. Brown-headed cowbirds, black-headed grosbeaks, house finches, house sparrows, mourning doves, robins, killdeer, starlings, and one northern flicker continued to eat my birdseed or flit about just outside my RV window.
But hopefully they were tucked away some place safe when Mother Nature discarded her lamb’s persona for a hungry lion’s roar.
The rain pelting on the roof of my wind-rocked RV sounded like Thor was frantically beating overhead with his hammer. The trees around me, spotlighted by lightning flashes, swayed deeply to the frenzied beat of surround-sound thunder that came in rolls.
This black-headed grosbeak is a regular visitor to my campground site. -- Photo by Pat Bean
My canine traveling companion, Maggie, is not one to be afraid of storms, but for this one she decided she wanted to curl up next to me on the couch where I was reading “A Sense of the World” by Jason Roberts. It’s the true story of James Holman, who despite being blind became one of the world’s greatest travelers during the early 1800s.
Its seemed an appropriate book for me to be reading during the storm, although I did more watching the disharmonious, strobe-flashed world out my window than I did absorbing the words on the page of my Kindle.
The sightless Holman, who used all his remaining senses to experience the world, would have loved this storm.
And so did I.
Pat Bean's blog 
I just came across this quotation in another blog: http://hopeseguin2011.wordpress.com
“I like it when it rains hard. It sounds like white noise everywhere, which is like silence but not empty.” — Mark Haddon (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time)
I would love to spend a night listening to steady rain.
love the pictures of the birds Pat- always love your daily blog too but as a crazy bird watcher i am enjoying seeing the different varieties – love “traveling ” with you and Maggie
chery
I love the storm report, Pat. I so love storms! Even though they drag me back in memories to the storm cellars full of water of the interior closets in Kansas; I still am stilled by the sound of the rain pelting on a roof.
My sound machine is set to a thunderstorm-to which I sleep every night.
Nancilynn
Sense of the World is on my list of all time favorite travel books.