A Book to Read: Of Walking in Rain by Matt Love

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Dark clouds pushed from the south creating a shadow over the Puget Sound. While some grabbed their repellent coats and umbrellas, I didn't even lift my hood. The rain fell, and I walked calmly to the bus stop. After boarding the bus and selectively finding a seat, I pulled out my new book. A new piece of Oregon literature, my eyes settle in to an author's collection of essays describing his experiences love affair with...rain.

After turning a few pages, an over-sized man who before boarding the bus used his backpack as some makeshift umbrella leaned toward me and said,

"Well that's a little ironic isn't it?"

I must have given him a look he interpreted as a prompt to elaborate. He continued,

"Well, you're dripping wet with rain and you're reading a book called, Of Walking in Rain."

I grinned and said, "Guess so," and continued reading. 

Since this encounter, I have read, re-read and highlighted my favorites lines; I am utterly inspired. The book is based on the rain that falls upon the Oregon Coast, my Oregon Coast to be exact. Matt Love, the author, high school English teacher and dog owner, offers romance and humor to what most deem a depressive weather forecast. Anyone who has ever lived in Western Oregon can find meaning and spiritual truth to Love's recount of rain. Most people work to avoid showers, drops, sheets, what-have-you...Love embraces it and sits with each drop as if they hold all the answers, and they often do. We could learn from this passion, this enthusiasm; I already have.

Some of my best memories involve coastal rain. I lost my innocence on a November afternoon. The rain was so loud on the roof we didn't need a cliché' love song to drown-out nature's sweet symphony. Every time my teenage heart was broken, I ran to the ocean for clarity. It was always the rain that wiped my tears away. I am most comfortable in a sweatshirt and jeans, and honestly get annoyed when the warm sun forces me to peel off my layers. I am naturally Snow White pale. The sun easily burns my skin, and is often too bright for my sensitive eyes. The rain never offers me discomfort. I have loved a perfume scent for years...the scent is naturally labeled... Rain. As you might agree, I was made for rainy weather.

There are many things to savor about Love's newest addition to Oregon writing – among them, Love gives such attention to the sensory depictions of rain I can almost feel it's dampness, see the slants of drops and hear the clatter against a window pane.

Occasionally, rain encourages you to remain indoors and have sex, as opposed to the sun, which nags you into mowing the lawn. (page, 30)

I kissed her goodnight and sprinted across the soggy lawn to my front porch. The jack o'lanterns still flickered with their mildewed grins. Rain had not yet extinguished them after a long wet battle. (page, 40)

I found myself in a state that Love's work, as with all great writers we know, often induces. The writing is not breathtaking. No, my breath is purified. One seems to draw in more oxygen; the pulse settles as when sitting on the ocean side and the mind becomes still. Love's irriguous narrative, often employing sharp and resonant metaphors, reveals the magic of an ordinary human experience. Love makes one thing abundantly clear: he's challenging you to sit and be comfortable with rain.

As a respected English teacher at Newport High School (my high school rival), Love extends his passion and challenge to his students (and sometimes strangers) by asking them to talk, write about, and experience...what other than... rain. Naturally (when challenging strangers and teenagers) opportunities for resistance, confessions and poetry present themselves. 

Moving through the collection of rain stories, it becomes clear rain is synonymous with life. What do you do when life is stagnant or rejects you? This book is his response to that question.

Matt Love and his beloved husky, Sonny. 

To advance into rain is to love it, or at least accept what it has to offer and not let it deter or defer. (p. 177)

If you're interested in receiving a copy, you can do so here.