Kathleen Sayce with the Community Historians
( Jim Sayce Photo)
If you’ve never taken a class from or heard a lecture by Kathleen Sayce, you have missed one of the stellar learning experiences about our area. Any of the participants in yesterday’s Community Historian group can testify to that. The two hours allotted to her fairly flew by and the subject matter wasn’t all that lightweight either.
Her topic was “Our Unique Environment” and she made big, important sounding concepts like geomorphology and hydrology not only understandable but totally interesting. It was all tied to right here in Pacific County and illustrated by maps and photographs and anecdotes and easily understood statistics. I loved it all and, most especially, her comments about rain.
She prefaced her rain remarks by reminding us of the old saw about the Eskimos/Inuit having fifty words for snow. She then referred us to a hand-out “Words and Phrases used to Describe Rain (compiled winter 2013 for CPHM Local Historians Project, Kathleen Sayce).” The list was divided into topics including ‘Light Rain Terms,’ ‘Heavy Rain Terms,’ ‘Rain Phrases,’ ‘Conditions of those Out in the Rain,’ and ‘Storm terms, Including Multiple Storms” – 126 different ways to say “rain”!!! Those Eskimos have nothing on us!
Usually Useless (in Oysterville) Umbrella
There were rain terms I’d never heard of like Mizzle and Skoosh and Sogg-fest and Virga which is rain that doesn’t reach earth. There was also a bit of extra information – like “Sun Break is a unique Pacific Northwest term” and “The Dalles counts a day as sunny if the sun is seen during the day.” Some of my favorite phrases included “Frog Strangler,” “Stump Thumper,” and “Never Ending.”
Kathleen asked if there were any audience members who had other terms – perhaps pet names used just in their families – and there were several responses. I was wishing Tucker were there to share that his family never uses “the R word” here at the beach. They just refer to the P word – precipitation. I can’t remember the reason just now – maybe it has to do with luck – as in if you don’t admit to it, it will go away sooner. More likely it has to do with P or no P, life goes on as usual here, no matter what. That’s just the way it is when the annual rainfall averages 100 inches a year!
Well, for now there’s no evidence at all of rain – not in any of its 126+ forms. A good day to take a long walk and check out the gazillion other features of our wonderful area that Kathleen talked about yesterday. Thanks, Kathleen, once again and as always!
My favourite term is “sucker hole”…when you see a patch of blue or maybe a bit of sun and decide you can go out to work…and the rain comes back just as you get to your destination.