I cautioned my husband that we would need rain gear. He looked out the window at the sky and saw no warning of imminent rain; why, the sun kept coming out and it seemed that the rain events were concluded for the day. I looked out the glass doors of the breakfast room and saw ample warning that we were yet in for more rain, and it would certainly catch us while we were out ambling on our ravine walk.

I wore a rain jacket, stuffed one into my pocket for little Riley, and my husband set out without one. But not very far. No sooner had we ventured far out of the house, noting that the driveway was well in the process of drying out after the last rainfall we'd experienced just an hour previously, than I felt the telltale ping on my head and sure enough the first tentative drops rapidly turned into a heavy rainfall. So we sat on the porch and waited. I put Riley's raincoat on him, and my husband ventured back into the house to grab a rainjacket.

Before too long the drenching had ceased and we set out again for the ravine, this time all of us properly clad. The trees were so soaked that though the rain had stopped, we were being pelted with rain falling off the bright-green-wet foliage. And then, as we ventured further into the ravine, fifteen minutes later the sun made its reappearance, sending bright shafts of light through the forest.

Unlike most Sundays we saw no one else out enjoying the adventure that a ravine ramble permits us. Until finally, close to the finish of our hour's perambulation we came across Lilly, a pure-white Shepherd, with her genial human, both of whom we hadn't seen in quite some time.