How does one describe rain falling upon the desert? Sometimes drop by drop as counted upon the sheet metal that lines the rooftop. Sometimes as an afternoon shower that reduces the heat for just a few hours. Often the storms are seen in the distance, on the far side of a ridge or across a wide valley. The waterfall beneath a distant cloud is painted as dark brush strokes across a backlit, fire lit sky orange and gray. And sometimes, just a few times each year the rain is described not by how it falls but by how it fills the mountain stream beds. Otherwise dry tributaries give rise to cascades over mineral stained lips and parched hanging gardens into fields of polished boulders, crafted over millions of years.

The first water is quickly absorbed by decaying litter and underlying sand. But as the hidden boundaries between ancient geological features are saturated, the water rises up, filling the space between grains of sand then cobbles, submerged tree trunks, and river banks. This is when the water falling down transforms into a race across the land; when we no longer count the rain drops but instead take heed of the shaking earth, at first from thunder and then the tumbling of stones and uprooted trees whose trunks are too large for human arms to embrace.

It is in these desert interactions that earth-bound creatures touch the sky, when heaven, as if needing to relieve itself of a heavy burden tears does open wide. We look not for angels nor the shadow of a bearded man, rather we applaud the branches of blinding lightning and celebrate the ability of a storm to cut to the core of our animal being.

In Cascabel the rain is a reason for celebration. The many varieties of succulents fill to nearly bursting their green skin. Garden vegetables and fruit trees no longer hesitate to yield. Seeds dormant just below the surface break through the crust, rising from seedling to six feet tall in less than two weeks, each day noting increase in height and stem diameter. Neighbors phone friends and send email messages with timing and directional movement of the storm. “Here it comes!”, “Get ready!”, and “We got over an inch already!” followed by “Made it to town” or “The road is out!”

The rain is welcomed even when it makes travel difficult for it reminds us of our incredibly small importance in a much larger world. When all that we have built, when all we have carefully organized and maintained can be undone in a matter of hours or in a single flash flood, the storm reminds us to respect and embrace the ambiguity of a world in which we are not in control, and to celebrate that which we are given, even if just a few times each year.