Some More of God’s Greatest Mistakes

I do not venture out in light, and dark has terrors far more fearsome than myself. Light is a cruel tale-teller. Better to go out in the rain when her sweet whispers can cover and conceal my faces. In rain the people on the street look down and look away, eyes blinded by the tears of angels, so they cannot see me. The rain is my cloak of invisibility. It hides their eyes so I can pace the sidewalk in the open without a glance or word of scorn in my direction.

The rain is my cloak of many colors. When I awake to hear a downpour on my windowpanes I dress and take my black umbrella with me to the store where I immediately make a purchase of another black umbrella. I make the the old one dry as best I can and hang it from my wrist as off I go under my new one looking for a worthy soul to pass the old one on to. Somewhere trying to avoid a puddle while holding a shirt or newspaper ineffectually above her head I find her and I tell her I’ve just bought a new umbrella so look here, it seems I have a spare. It’s not nearly so nice as this new one I’ve got but it might do some good for you, young lady.

I stay just long enough to see her grateful smile but not so long until it turns to hatred when she sees who she’s been thanking so profusely.

The rain is of course also my enemy, and I curse its wetness and the impossibility of keeping trouser legs completely out of puddles. I am one with a thousand choruses of curses echoing throughout the city and our common enemy, the rain, brings us a sort of closeness. The rain is my shield, for you would not seek to embrace a dripping mass of flesh and cloth and anyway our umbrellas project force fields to the ground preventing us from brushing up against each other accidentally. When I am safe from you I can be one of you after the rain has made us brothers.