Monsoon Season in Arizona is strange and yet I like it. The experience is hard to describe, but it is exciting all the same.

Today while I was at work, the air was so still that it was stifling, oppressive, almost to the point of suffocating. The heat was as sticky as walking into a steamy bathroom on a hot day.

There is a "Thunderhead" (a rounded mass of clouds that often appears before a thunderstorm) far off in the distance to the east. There the clouds sat, high and mighty above the Superstition Mountains, charting their course....waiting patiently to unleash their fury on the valley below.

The sky turns pink from a dust storm that has come out of nowhere. It is not a severe dust storm and it passes quickly. The wind is not cool like the California coastal winds, but like the hot air from a blow dryer set on high. There are pieces of paper flying around, getting caught up in dust devils or hot air thermals and they cath an air pocket and float slowly and gently back down to the ground. The wind whistles through small openings and makes harmonic-like noises across air conditioner vents and Bar-B-Q grills (like the sound of someone rubbing the rim of a crystal glass). There is also a strange medium pitched buzzing sound coming from an insect called cicada. The cicada comes out of hibernation every 17 years. Then, of course, there are the usual neighborhood sounds of kids playing and dogs barking.

On the northern horizon I can acutually see the rain. The rain looks like gray sheer curtains hanging from the sky. Towards the west, behind the pyramid shaped rock that landmarks Scottsdale, I can see a curtain of rain. West Phoenix, Fountain Hills and Chandler are caught in separate downpours. There will be flash flood watches for those areas. There is a large curtain of rain that looks like it will be over my house soon. As the rain gets closer, it becomes harder and harder to distinguish where the rain begins and where it ends. It probably has something to do with distance, proportion, and perception.

It starts to cool off, and the smell of a desert rain is in the air. The wind is cooler now and blowing in gusts that twirl my hair into tangles and tugs at my cloths. The wind stops and everything is still, silent, too quiet....eerie. Even the bugs have stopped their buzzing and chirping....the flash of a thunderbolt pierces the sky, outlining the clouds and their mystical shapes. I count like I have done since childhood 1...2...3...there is a loud crack of thunder, so loud that it rattles the windows and scares the dogs and kids. The wind starts to blow again. The warm wind caresses my bare arms and legs giving me goose bumps. There is another flash of lightning and the thunder echoes and rumbles across the sky. I follow the sound with my eyes like I would if someone were walking across the roof of my house. I feel a drop of rain on my bare feet, and another drop on my upturned face and another on my arm. I hear the pat...pat...pat of the rain on the thirsty, dry ground. The sky is dark and uncanny. I can understand how the early Indians must have felt. I, too, feel the energy of all the elements in motion. All my senses are alive. The sun is setting in the west and has created a halo effect on that horizon. On the eastern horizon, the thunderstorm is exploding with electricity and thunder. The desert rain smells moist and earthy, like cloves and thyme, orange blossoms and chaparral. Then it begins to rain harder. I take refuge in my house and watch the thunderstorm unleash its fury from the safety of my family room. Within minutes the rain is running like rivers off of my roof, creating mud holes in my yard. About 45 minutes later the rain has passed and moved into another neighborhood.

The forcast for tomorrow is "hot and humid with evening thunder showers".