Photo: Shutterstock

The rain falls in sheets outside my kitchen window. It’s coming down strong. And noisy. Surprisingly noisy.

I am soap-sudding my dishes. Supper is prepared in my head. But before I start cooking I remember the daily chapter of Tehillim I’ve promised to recite for the refuah of a young lady.

I don’t like committing to say a daily chapter of Tehillim. I can be notoriously absentminded. And with the myriad strands of life I’m constantly trying to weave into submission I frequently find myself frowning at the mirror upset at missing a day or two. A chapter or two. Precious vials of health. And I hate being the one who has let the team down.

To placate myself I’ll say: “Ah well. You were only meant to say the one chapter. It isn’t that terrible. You can start again tomorrow.” And I may be right. But I’m also wrong. I realize that when I listen to the rain.

Have you ever heard the delicate kiss of a dewdrop slipping off a leaf?

I haven’t either. It’s inaudible. A single raindrop will sink into the thirsty earth as softly and silently as a cat’s paw. Yet we all sit up and take notice when it’s pouring with rain. Where does all that energy come from?

Someone once sent me a short video clip of a most unusual choir.

People of all shapes and ages stand ten rows deep and twenty across leaning forward over microphones. They stand silent. Until the maestro sends a decisive signal. Slowly slowly… easy does it … they raise their hands as one and rub their thumbs against their forefingers. Not one. Not two. But ten-score performers all rubbing their thumbs and making their fingers do their bidding. The sound rushes through the hall like the rustling of 50 000 leaves in the energetic breeze that sweeps in before a rainstorm.

The rustling advances into a trickle of raindrops. Slow rhythmic pitter-patters elicited by the clicking of thumbs and middle fingers like flamenco dancers warming up in the wings.

Now if you or I or a circle of kids would click their thumbs like castanets it still wouldn’t sound like the pitter-patter of raindrops. But here we had … not one not two but ten-score performers standing ten rows deep and twenty across clicking thumbs and middle fingers in perfect unison. And they brought the rain down.