One day last week, as I was home in the late afternoon, I glanced out the window and discovered that the weather had turned. It was pouring rain. Since it had been a sunny day before that, Chris had set off to work in the morning without an umbrella. So, I decided to dash out to bring him an umbrella – it was a true downpour at that moment. After giving him a quick call, I shoved my wallet and my cell phone into the pockets of my rain jacket, grabbed an umbrella and headed out the door of our 2nd floor apartment.

As I stepped outside the building and turned left, to head toward Chris’ office, I was confronted by two unexpected events. One,  it had  actually stopped raining in the time it took me to get down the 2 flights of steps from our apartment.

And two, there was a spectacularly colored rainbow visible at the end of our street in front of me.

But remember all I’d taken on my way out the door was the wallet, the cell phone, and the umbrella. No camera. Argh.

I took me less than 2 minutes to get back upstairs to grab the little camera. But by the time I got downstairs again, the rainbow was a little bit less strong. However, the colors were still good enough to merit a quick photo:

At the end of the street, a rainbow

Closer look: A Rainbow at the end of our street

By the time I reached the end of the street, the rainbow was even more faint, and by the time I reach Chris’ office, the skies had pretty well cleared,  and both the rainbow and the storm were over.

So, lessons learned from the unexpected rain storm:

1. Always offer to bring Chris an umbrella when there’s a sudden storm. It’s the nice thing to do … and there might be unexpected rainbow.

2. Always remember to bring a camera along with the umbrella. It’s the right thing to do … to be prepared for the moment when that rainbow appears.