"I can see clearly now the rain has gone..."

"And in a little while the heavens grew black with clouds and wind, and there was a great rain."
                                                                                 1 Kings 18: 45

For weeks past the ground has been getting drier and drier. In the fields around the village great cracks appeared in the earth, as the land grew parched and weary; the levels in the reservoirs crept lower and lower, and the threatened hose-pipe ban became reality.

And then the rain came. On and on it rained, for days and days, sometimes in heavy-sheeted downpours, and sometimes in a gentle monotonous drizzle; sometimes it threw in a bit of hail, just for a change, and sometimes thunder and lightening would throw in their two penn'orth (so as not to feel left out of the fun).


They say (whoever 'they' are) that no amount of rain at this time of year will make any difference to Britain's Situation of Drought, because it all gets soaked up by the plants and there's none left to fill the reservoirs; perhaps that is true, but I think there would have been quite enough left for the reservoirs, if only the water people would keep them in proper trim, and not let them leak all over the place. 
However! the plants certainly did soak it up; and in just a week our lane has been transformed from a brownish youth, only just out of winter, into the full verdant glory of Spring's young womanhood...