Winter Rains

Here in coastal Virginia, we don't pile up the satisfyingly visible drfts of snow with which we measured the replenishment of water tables in the north. Here the winter rains come and soak into the heavy clay, disappearing as the moisture gradually fills the lower spaces where our water resides. November rains bring a kind of laziness - it is so gray and damp outside, better to stay in, curl up, read a book....

When we first moved out here to "south-of-Pungo" where the roads are more like paved dikes between drainage ditches, it wasn't unusual to see the ditches running fast and full of water after a heavy or prolonged steady rain, as if you were driving on a dry strip in the middle of a small river. Sticks and trash would be racing along beside the car as the runoff water ran along the roadside ditches on either side until they turned off into the sloughs that carry the water into the swamp or waterways.

It's been several years since we've seen that kind of rain excess - even in tropical storm deluges. The dryness that lingers from the drought seasons must still have left reservoirs drained in the soil underground, for I never see saturation to runoff anymore. The rain and rain and rain moves down, even through our semi-impermeable clay soil to the still-empty spaces down under. Little water moves over the ground into the ditches.

The land and the trees still seem greedy for the long, cold drink. And, despite the "swampiness" of our local landscape, we - farmers and homeowners alike - are still grateful for the winter rain.