Rain and Leftover Fireworks

The rain's been around for days, not storming but steadily falling and the sky is gray and bleary like its eyes are half open.

When the weather is like that it makes me think that the sky is in a mood. Like it's a person that feels weird. Not sad, well maybe a little sad, but that's what's so weird about it. It isn't depressed and it doesn't have anything to be bummed about, but still it feels kind of eh and it can't shake it.

It fell on my windshield last night like little taps on the shoulder. It was the end of New Year's Day and I was driving from a friend's house with a neat sprinkling of raindrops on the car that fit like a guitar pick tucked between strings or a lighter in a box of cigarettes. They clung to the glass just long enough to let me know they'd been there before they were wiped away. With them gone I could see my neighbors dragging the Christmas leftovers to the trash, and other drivers whose hangovers were almost gone. The rain drops gathered again and splintered in green when a firework exploded. It was even brighter than it would have been at the Ball Drop because it had been waiting since midnight to be shot off, and finally here was its chance.

Maybe the sky's not feeling weepy and weird, maybe it's just wringing out what's leftover like the rest of us. It's a new year but also the end of another day with rain and leftover fireworks. I turned off the radio and listened to the tires splash, with intermittent clear visions of the wet, black road ahead of me through my half open eyes.