I horrified my colleagues today, although not for the usual reasons.

Typhoon 18 (aka Typhoon Etau) hit the center of Japan today and we in the Tokyo area were cursed with all the rain but none of the train cancellations. This meant I had to go to work. I didn’t get horribly wet when I went to work, as the rain was in “start then stop then pour then stop” mode (I believe this is an actual scientific term).

In fact, I didn’t get wet until I went to the grocery store at lunch time and my umbrella decided to express its inside-out self.

What horrified my colleagues was my decision to walk to the station when it was clear that the sky was about to fall. I predicted it would fall about 10 minutes after I left the office. They pointed out there was a bus and I pointed out that 1) I’d end up like Totoro standing in the rain waiting for the bus or 2) I’d get packed into a hot sweaty bus full of students and end up wet and stinky rather than just wet.

What I didn’t tell them, because this would horrify them, is that I actually don’t mind walking in the rain, as long as I’m going home. (Walking in the rain going to work is a different problem.)

Because I can’t smell it, rain to me is sound and touch. The constant burr of rain on my umbrella and the road and the taps of rain hitting my shoes and my legs and the water splashing as I walk and the cold water on the back of my legs combine as a kind of white noise with texture. A heavy rain also washes out the colors on the street which makes the experience even more about noise and texture.

A depiction of my walk home. (Note: Rain not to scale, but that’s what it felt like.)

Then I get home and have to peel off my shoes and figure out a way to dry them (unless it’s raining again tomorrow which means I’ll just wear the same shoes since they are already wet) and I leave wet footprints across the floor.

By the time I get dried off and changed and sat down with a cup of coffee I feel as if I’ve had a shower and am much more relaxed than I would have been from just walking home. I sip coffee and hope it’s not going to be raining when I go to work tomorrow.