Soaked to the bone

The wettest I’ve ever been was the night of my 38th birthday. It was the same day that my husband, parrot, and I moved to our new town. We arrived after dark the day before we were to get the keys to our new home, checked into a hotel room, and headed out for dinner. Our parrot loves to travel in the car but hates hotel rooms, so we took her with us so she could sit in the car.

Dinner was a random selection from the GPS that turned out to be a French / Vietnamese place within walking distance of what would become our new home. Throughout dinner we heard thunder, but by the time we realized it was a serious storm the rain was coming down in torrents and the thunder was loud, fast, and frequent.

We were worried about our little nervous bird. It had already been a long, difficult day for her, so headed out into the rain. At first we had the luxury of dashing from awning to awning, but when we reached the corner of the building there was nothing but open parking lot. My husband took off. He was wearing running shoes and looked like a cheetah as he vanished into a fog of rain. I was in flip flops.

I was already dripping wet, and after stumbling through a few puddles I realized it wasn’t possible to get any wetter. I resigned myself to a slow jog. Life moved in slow motion as I trotted toward the dry zone. I must have been really slow because when I finally got to the car the Cheetah asked why it took me so long. Even the parrot looked confused!

The next morning our wet clothes were still wetter than if they had just come out of the washer!