Rainbaths & Vinegar

It was one of those technically spring days, where I experienced all four seasons within waking hours. It started with an ethereal fog curling around the base of the mountains. Venturing outdoors in my robe, I spied shoots of green in the drab brown lawn. By noon, summery sunshine had burned away the gray, in time for autumnal winds to blow in. At dusk, snow sifted down. All day long, perhaps spurred by those tender shoots of grass, I desired rain…a true, warm spring rain, a bring-May-flowers rain, the kind of rain that thrilled me as a kid.

Where I grew up in Indiana, mudpies were not just for nursery rhymes, splashing in puddles was mandatory, and spreading arms like wings and twirling with your face to the sky, tongue sticking out to catch raindrops, was just what you did.

But there was nothing, and never will be anything quite like one of Mom’s rainy spa days. I’ve been to hoity-toity resorts where green mud slathered head to toe is reputed to give skin a healthy glow. Boy, was Mom ahead of the game. She encouraged us, clad only in our skivvies, to frolic in the downpour, roll in the mud, splatter it on one another—do all, but eat it. You never heard such laughter—the gut-level joy as palpable as the mud.

After our nourishing mud treatment we were handed a bar of Ivory soap and we literally showered in the rain. Passing inspection, including behind the ears, we were ushered into the kitchen where a speckled navy and white, canning kettle filled with rain water simmered on the stove. One by one, sometimes blue-lipped with goosebumps, we were given a thorough hair washing with rain water and vinegar.

“It will make your hair soft and silky,” Mom said, towel drying our shaggy manes until they literally squeaked.

Dressed in warm hand-me-downs, we settled inside for the rest of the rainy day. We played house, popped corn, or my sister and I gave our dolls their own spa treatment—poor things.

As we grew older, Mom proffered up a lot of home-style, shoestring-budget beauty secrets. Egg yolks, from our very own hens, beaten to a froth and applied to the face were an effective, pore tightening mask. Honey sometimes worked, too. Baking soda kept our teeth white. Empty, clean, cut out on both ends, orange juice cans turned curlers worked wonders when we no longer wanted childish rag curls. We were given so much and it cost so little, but time and ingenuity.

On some rainy spa days, the sky turned yellow-green. The maple trees moaned and bent in the wind, their leaves rustling and anxious. Safe and eagle-eyed inside, we watched for a flash or streak of lighting, counted how long before the thunder clapped, and calculated how near the storm was to our old, clapboard house.

And sometimes, the sun burst through the clouds sending fingers of light to rake the earth. On the best of days, a rainbow arced over the old barn, beside the mulberry tree.

There’s something to be said about being clean, and warm…and loved.