The rain fell in a torrent. Raindrops bounced off the ground. Lighting lit up the sudden darkness. I involuntarily counted the seconds between sight and sound of the thunder that followed. Since light travels so much faster, the way to tell your distance from a lightning strike is to "one-thousand-and-one, one-thousand-and-two," until the roll of kettle drums reach a crescendo, and then figure five seconds to the mile.

As the hours wore on, I gave up counting. There wasn't any point in pretending that this storm was going to pass quickly. Many times the flash and report cracked overhead simultaneously. Through the walls of our threadbare tents we watched a number of bolts strike the mountain, the main stock of lightning etching it's pattern upon the canvas, or silhouetting a tree. The stench of burnt ozone was overpowering.

Surprisingly, the horses endured this awesome experience rather tranquilly. Because of the ground currents of electrical energy I had instructed my family to crouch upon our sponge rubber mats inside their tents. I also decided not to bell our horses. and let them go free without their chain-link sidelines to avoid any attraction to metal. This was taking a chance, for if they had stampeded and scattered—well it would have been extremely difficult rounding them up again.

However, they only lost their head one time. A tree was hit near their sheltering spot, and fell in a shower of sparks. Fortunately, BJ was outside making a check when the horses took off at a run, and he was able to calm them down. He tied a few of the leaders up short. For the rest of the night our string stood standing head to tail, gathered about to protect Tag from the lightning and rain.

We could have used a little more protection ourselves. Our tents were becoming too trail worm to turn much water. They leaked. We put cooking pots under seams that had begun to part, and lay there listening—all night—to the "ping, pang, pong," of drops of water collecting. A homemade xylophone to accompany Stravinsky's Night on Bald Mountain being performed outside.


Eventually the lightning moved on, but the rain that stayed fell mainly on our domain. Morning brought the bad news. Unlike a summer storm passing, and then the sun dashing out to dry everything off, this was a wintertime front. Fall was falling. We had no promise of the rain letting up in another day, or week, or month. In Washington state, once the storms of September begin rolling in, another is sure to follow.

Like our tents, the rest of our outfit also was too worn to provide much protection from the rain. Long ago I had made the decision not to carry rubber galoshes, as I felt a thorough greasing of our leather riding boots would be adequate. This idea turned out to be as wet as a soggy shoe. I hadn't considered the impossibility of preventing leaks through holes worn in a sole, and split seams.