Walking in the rain

On of my best memories of my childhood is walking in the rain. At first it was playing in the rain [you know the type of rain a gentle downpour, a farmers rain]. My two brothers would dare one or the other to run off the porch in the rain. As the game progressed one of us would stay and walk with our face to the rain. That was too much for the two left on the porch, we all ran out running around trying to catch the rain in our mouth. The the puddles started to form; too tempting for us. Down we went wrestling and getting really dirty, all of us. It is a good thing we have a good Mom. She would pretend she did not see us until the game got too rough or the rain got harder. She would then run out, grab us up, and march us into the house. Now comes the really fun part. We did not have running water in the house, [hot water heater] what was that. She made us stand on the porch in our wet, dirty clothes and took us one at a time to the pump for a bath, first the clothes, on our body then she undressed us, washed us, wrapped us in a sheet, gave us a hug and sent us in the house to get dry and in clean clothes. As children we did not realize the work it took for her to keep us in clean clothes. Wash day was a whole day in the yard boiling the clothes in a pot and running them through two rinse waters, all being wrung out by hand. She was and is a wonderful Mom. More on walking the rain next time. Stay happy.