Saturday Morning Rain

Day 3 - May 24

Saturday morning. Breakfast at Camp Inertia. And it’s raining.

Not a downpour, but something that varies from a fine mist to a light rain. It’s after 11 a.m. It’s been raining since I got up. Enough precipitation to form puddles in the seats of canvas chairs left out last night. Enough to turn the very top surface of the caliche into sticky mud. I’m wearing my rain shell over my T-shirt and shorts.

It sprinkled a bit yesterday morning too -- just enough to settle the dust, as we used to say when it rained, reliably, every festival. In recent years, that hasn’t been the case. Texas has been -- still is -- gripped by drought. We’ve lived through a few festivals where it didn’t rain at all. And hot days are hotter than they used to be, or maybe I’m just getting older and don’t take the heat so well.

This year so far, weather has been the way I remember it in the old days. Cool for setting up at Land Rush; nice breezes in the theater after the sun goes down. By midnight, it’s chilly enough to put on a jacket. I’m wearing the same hooded playera I’ve worn at Kerrville for the past 20 years, the red-striped one I "borrowed" from Javier’s closet not long after we moved in together. And I was glad to have a wool blanket last night when I went to bed. Don’t know how long this will last, but it’s lovely.

Today Inertia is serving fresh fruit salad, Little Smokies and French toast made with croissants. How does this compare with Kerrville 14 years ago? I’m not sure. Camp Inertia was well established when Hot Jams & Cold Showers came out. It was there during the years when I worked on the book; Val and Catherine were some of my first readers who kept me going through the process. They always liked feeding people. But the camp has evolved over the years. Their menus have gotten more organized, and the breakfast and dinner crowds have gotten bigger. I didn’t count, but I bet they served 30 folks this morning. There’s a kitchen area, a dining area, and a dishwashing setup that’s worthy of a commercial kitchen.