Rain

Hell, and I thought rain would make everything better.

't was a long summer, as hot and as dry as your grandmother's - excuse me. I forgot there are ladies present. Let's say it was really hot and really dry. The gras kept dying in every garden, no matter how much water the people poured over it. The town counsil prohibited watering gardens as the resources shrank. Some old sharts wouldn't listen, of course. You know, they are as stupid as dusty boots. We even had the police come out and tell them off.

Speaking of which - the dust was everywhere. While the plants kept dying, the ground dried out and was ripped apart. Nothing like the forces of nature to show you where the hammer hangs. Going to the store for some fresh fruit, all you found was shriveled up and looked rather sorry than tasty. And it was covered in dust. My sister, who has always been obsessed with everything home-made and as fresh as possible (her husband used to joke, "If we have left-over horsemeat, I'll ride it to work tomorrow." - well, he used to when he still was her husband; the last things they said about each other were less than nice) - where was I? Ah yes... my crazy, vitamin-obsessed sister started buying canned goods. You had to take the cans home and clean them off, otherwise all the dust ended up in your dinner nevertheless.

And the sun kept shining.

Soon everything was brown and gray, and the people became increasingly aggressive. Next was a ban on fire weapons. If the mayor hadn't been clever that once, we'd probably all be dead by now.

I wonder if it would have made a difference.

The strangest thing was that, one by one, the bigger radio stations and TV programs started dying. The shows became sporadic, and then they stopped. We started playing cards again, like in the old times. A few old folks even had ancient grammophones - you needed to crank them up, literally, for some music, and the records they had were not old-fashioned, but rather dead-fashioned. But as Pa used to say, you got what you got.

And when nobody expected it, the rain came. At noon the clouds began to gather, as if they had rehearsed it again and again. The light show was great, but the thunder drove the cattle mad. I hear Johnson had to shoot all his young bulls. Stupid animals. We were mesmerized. Whoever had the opportunity to abandone his work did so and went in search of a safe place to watch.

That was six days ago. The rain hasn't stopped since. The ground was much too dry to take it up, so our streets became rivers. A few people drowned. I haven't seen an animal in days. Still no sign of life by TV or radio. The people I have met the last few days went about like zombies. We don't know what to do, and we are afraid.