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I think it's because it's so rainy outside right now -- rainy in a quiet, determined way -- but I'm thinking about San Francisco, and imagining what it must be like during this small, peaceful storm in the house where I grew up.

There are new owners now. I'm sure everything looks different.

Still, I remember buying umbrellas and watching my dad shake his head, saying we'd never use them. I remember once when it rained during the Chinese New Year parade, and he told us to enjoy it because it would never rain again. I remember water rationing, and the magnet on our refrigerator that had a picture of a heart, then said "to save," and then had a picture of a water droplet.

But for some reason, right now, I really remember the nights when it rained. I think it's because as I type this, I'm listening to the soft sound of rain falling outside through the slightly opened window, and feeling like if I wanted it enough, I could open my eyes and be back home.

For some reason, in the way that sometimes you remember the stillnesses about a place where you've spent a long time, I remember evenings. During night storms the orange light cast by the street lamp made the water running down the hill sparkle as if there was some sort of celebration outside in the dark. But it was a somber celebration -- there was always a sort of hush that fell over the city when the clouds moved in from the ocean. You could hear the wind moving through the trees, and sometimes against the windows.

And the quiet noise of cars going up the hill through the rain, which sounded lonely somehow, even if it might not have been -- even if the people inside might have really been going to a party.

And how everything seemed still -- there were fewer people walking around on the streets -- and all we could hear was the rain on the skylight and the infrequent, distinct, sound of a bus casting its own particular light through the windows in the dark.

At first, we could see the rain on the skylight, but when it had been raining for a very long time, or particularly heavily, all we could see were the streaks under the angry black sky.

And then in the morning, when the storm had passed, I remember how the air was so clear and clean and it seemed like everything bad had been washed away -- like we could start over again -- like everything was going to be all right, after all.