My best memories of rain are from the '70s

We’ve been blessed with a lot of rain this May and June. Rain reminds me of the cool, sometimes thunderous summer nights of my youth. Yet there was something soothing and romantic about rain that made people want to sing.

Some of the most fun times were playing in the rain when we lived in north Portales in the 1970s. The road adjacent to our home on North Avenue B was dirt and, when it flooded, the calm after the storm was a chorus of croaking. The flooded street became a river filled with frogs.

Since we lived in the corner house, the “sapo serenade” was right outside our bedroom window.

If it wasn’t the frogs croaking about rain, then it was the pop stars of the 1970s crooning about rain on the radio. If you’re old enough to remember, who could forget the rocking Eddie Rabbitt, with his 1979 hit, “Well, I love a rainy night. I love a rainy night. Such a beautiful sight. I love to hear the thunder, watch the lightning when it lights up the sky.”

Another great rain song of the 1970s was Rupert Holmes’ one-hit wonder, “Escape,” more commonly known as “The Piña Colada Song.” Know what I’m talking about?

“…If you like piña coladas and getting caught in the rain. If you’re not into yoga, if you have half a brain. If you like making love at midnight in the dunes of the cape. Then I’m the love that you’ve looked for, write to me and escape...”

The Piña Colada song was the last No. 1 hit of the 1970s, riding at No. 1 in December of 1979, and continuing into the next decade.

Finally, my favorite song as a pre-teen, and I admit that I am a bit eccentric, was Donna Summer’s version of “Mac Arthur Park” in 1980.

It goes, “...Someone left the cake out in the rain. I don’t think that I can take it, cause it took so long to make it, and I’ll never have that recipe again …”

It may have rained on our parade, but it never dampened our spirits. Let it rain. Let it rain.

Helena Rodriguez is a Portales native. Contact her at:

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