Woke up this morning to the sound of soft rain on the roof, one of the loveliest and most comforting sounds I can imagine. It’s raining again, and the air is, as always here in south Louisiana, damp. The garden shop owner who sold me the Meyer lemon tree I gave Julie for Christmas — that’s it in the photo above — told me, “People who aren’t familiar with how wet we are come down here in the winter thinking the temperatures are an accurate guide to how cold it is. Then they get here and they’re freezing, because they didn’t think how much colder it would feel with all the humidity in the air.”

That’s true. The coldest morning in my personal memory was every morning I woke up in Anchorage those days in February. Other than that, the coldest mornings were spent in the swamp near the hunting camp as a child, especially when the wind was off the Mississippi River. That wet cold seems to soak into your bones. I’ve trudged through feet of snow in New York City and Philadelphia, and not been nearly as cold as I was in the swamp in winter.

Anyway, I love the rain, and the damp. It feels like England to me — or rather, as is closer to the truth, I have never minded the rain when I’ve been in England because it reminds me of home. There is something about the rain in Louisiana that makes me feel more myself. I am abashed to contradict this beautiful e.e. cummings poem, but yes, indeed, the rain here has such small hands.