Learning to Love Dry Season

I moved to Panama from Portland, Oregon when I was 18 years old. The lush green of Panama’s rainy season reminded me of Oregon, although I never really knew what rain was until I experienced my first tropical downpour.  I loved the green, the rain, and the thunder storms.

But I didn’t love my first dry season as much. The rain totally stops for 3-4 months. Everything that was a lush green dies.  I was shocked by the change in the landscape, the dryness and dead grass, and disliked dry season from the very beginning.

We are nearing the end of dry season now.  The grass is almost totally dead. The trees have sparse leaves, some have lost their leaves entirely.  Others, like our neighbor’s mango tree, are getting new, fresh green leaves and blooming.  The air is dry and hot, and yet surprisingly fresh feeling after the mugginess of rainy season.

You can count on it being sunny every day. No reason to worry about a torrential downpour ruining your plans for the day.  This weekend we are even planning on camping overnight at the river.  We will be camping in tents, which you could never ever do in rainy season because I don’t think they have invented a tent that could hold up to Panama’s rain.

All the wild brush around the house has died down, and the land has a sparse, and yet clean look to it.  Since I don’t have to hack away at the jungle trying to take over the yard, I am recently inspired to replant my garden, as nature’s season have made room for new growth.

Then there’s the breeze.  We have constant breezes throughout the dry season. They are wonderful, refreshing breezes. Even though the temperatures are the same as during the rainy season, the drier air and breezes make is feel cooler.

The mud is gone from our front yard, allowing us to sit outside and enjoy a cool evening, or for the girls to play house or have a tea party in the cool of the afternoon, or in the shade of the neighbor’s big mango tree.

I love dry season now.  What I used to see as dead and depressing, I now find fresh and invigorating.  I see the opportunity for new growth.  I tend to see dry seasons of life the same.  I now look back and see the challenges of the past and pushed me to seek God as never before, to grow and face challenges that I never thought I could.

This year I am not looking forward to the beginning of rainy season, with its mud, and muggy air, and downpours making me cancel my plans for the day.  However, it will come and I will love that occasional cool evening caused by the rain, and the great excuse to stay home when I really didn’t want to go out anyway.  I have always appreciated that here in Panama a rainstorm is a perfectly acceptable excuse not to go anywhere.

But in the meantime I will enjoy this dry season.