|Lake Atitlan during the rainy season|
The nearby mountains are covered in gray clouds, the storm appearing much worse there than in the valleys, and I wonder about the Mayan people who live on the mountain, in their small villages far above town. How they must travel through the relentless pouring rain to work in their fields on the hillsides. They will navigate the steep, slippery, muddy paths down toward the local market to sell their vegetables. They can't afford to wait for the rain to stop, as the rainy season starts in May and goes through September. It is the Guatemalan winter.
The storm seems ominous and threatening as I think about these people in the hills around Lake Atitlan. They manage, sun or rain, regardless. They tend their crops, come to town, carrying huge loads on their backs, to sell what they have grown, crafts they have made. Like all people everywhere, they need to survive, maybe get ahead, wanting a better life for their children. Maybe one day they can get enough money for the children to stop working in the fields and go to school.
I'm embarrassed at myself cowering from the rain in my large house with a garden, upset that I can't hear the sound on my Netflix movie.