isn't there supposed to be a silver lining somewhere?
Photo by J. Harrington
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Our discovery of the climate outlook was triggered by today's search to see if we've yet broken the record for wettest year on record in the Twin Cities. We saw a notice a day or so ago that said we were within 2.5 inches of the annual record. The day's rain must already be an inch or more. It was .93" at 12:53 at the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport [MSP]. For today and tomorrow the predicted rainfall amount is 1.5" - 2.0". We still have two months plus before year's end. The Minnesota Weather Almanac informs us that the average monthly precipitation at MSP is 1.77" in November and 1.16 in December. Unless our pattern breaks abruptly and we start a drought, I think we've got the "All Wet Record" in the bucket.
Closer to home, the Sunrise River pools in Carlos Avery Wildlife Management Area are holding more water than we recall seeing at this time of year. A wetter than normal Winter may well make for a particularly interesting Spring with snow melt, frozen ground and already high water. If our long term climate will now be wetter than the historical averages, will the folks around White Bear Lake petition Minnesota Department of Natural Resources for more groundwater pumping to keep the lake from flooding surrounding properties?
Rain
Toward evening, as the light failedand the pear tree at my window darkened,I put down my book and stood at the open door,the first raindrops gusting in the eaves,a smell of wet clay in the wind.Sixty years ago, lying beside my father,half asleep, on a bed of pine boughs as raindrummed against our tent, I heardfor the first time a loon’s sudden waildrifting across that remote lake—a loneliness like no other,though what I heard as inconsolablemay have been only the sound of somethinguntamed and namelesssinging itself to the wilderness around itand to us until we slept. And thinking of my fatherand of good companions goneinto oblivion, I heard the steady sound of rainand the soft lapping of water, and did not knowwhether it was grief or joy or something otherthat surged against my heartand held me listening there so long and late.
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