Yored Geshem

It's raining! B"H, it's raining!! It's still cold, and the wind is biting, but finally it's raining!

People tell us that even if it rains for a month, we'll still have a deficit of water for next summer -- but I don't care! I'm so relieved that it's finally raining. California, like Israel, relies on the rain and the snowpack, so the instincts of a lifetime kicked in when December passed without rain---and every morning I've awakened, pulled up the trissim and looked first at the sky for clouds. The two small storms that breezed through earlier in the Fall only damped down the ground a bit. It wasn't enough.

But this morning I awoke to the sound of something hitting the plastic roof over the sunporch....not a pitter-patter of drops but the hard, steady beat of real rainfall.

It's a Shehechiyanu moment! Thank You!

*photo credit: bubamara @ Jerusalem Shots