Ever since I saw Raj Kapoor and Nargis in the song, Pyar Hua Ikraar Hua, my idea of monsoon romance was sealed; a single umbrella with me hanging onto a love that could have very well been my Siamese soul. But that was a long time ago.

 As time passed by, along with shedding all of my romantic illusions, I was forced also to reconcile to the scientific definition of rains-“Water condensed from atmospheric vapor, falling in drops,” if unprepared, drenches you whether you like it or not (my addition).

 So here I was today, a prisoner of my own ‘wiser’ self, trapped in a 1200 square feet house, all alone and lonely. The noisy pitter-patter on the roof was not enough and with love nowhere in sight to share this broody moment, I decided to romance the rain. Alone.

I set out in my fancy Reeboks for a long walk in the clouds- minus my Keanu Reeves. The clouds had burst alright. Everyone was scurrying around looking for some kind of shelter. I, on the other hand marched along like a giggly kid on the back roads of an overcrowded neighborhood. The idea was to romance the rain and not run from it; and romance it, I did.

 Within minutes I was drenched. Most of the water though, came from the speeding cars that were having a hay day with me. Luckily their sadism ended at my waist. I opened my mouth and saved my Bisleri money. It was magical tasting the pure rain with drenched lips. For once the smell of the gutter and the garbage dumps didn’t matter. They had made peace with the air, and my senses.

 As I trudged along, dodging some wickedly curious glances, I mutely welcomed a fellow mad woman who was as soaked in ecstasy as me. Initially, it was just a knowing smile when our eyes met and followed each other, perhaps thinking- “I know what you did this monsoon!” But on the way back as I bumped into her, she let out a loud guffaw and we  spontaneously and unanimously said the word, “Refreshing!” We sounded more like a Liril ad and I guess, looked like one too. But who cared.

 My journey continued as I saw three dogs huddled together to discuss the night’s dinner; a family of centipedes rushing to a home which seemed far away.  On a bark laden with the memories of many monsoons, a mother pigeon lovingly blanketed her baby with her own body and somewhere far on the banks of (what I now thought of, as) the river, a group of storks strutted their stuff. Their feast had just begun.

 Mother Nature knows best. She never fails to mesmerize or surprise and today too she surprised me. I was witness to an arranged marriage of sorts; the sewer and the canal, the soil and the water. Hope surged within as I watched them embrace with wanton urgency, long lost souls embarking on an unknown journey together. Looking at them rejoice, it was difficult not to believe, marriages are indeed made in heaven.

 My walk was coming to an end but a new experience had just begun. I had seen myself  oscillating from the disillusioned girl that left her apartment to a girl, now soaked in the tender realization of her own drenched, sated soul.

 There was solace in feeling  that the clouds pour down on you if you let them. It’s like someone has slapped you in the face with a gust of life and forced you to live. So I lived.  My Keanu Reeves might just be lost in his own clouds as yet and I may never find another Raj Kapoor. But as long as the clouds burst down upon me, I will continue being the eternal romantic.

Just like the  guy who breezed by on a cycle singing, “Ik Ladki Bheegi Bhaagi Si!” 

Insia Dariwala is a graduate from F.I.T New York (Advertising and Mass communications), loves to tell stories and is a filmmaker. ‘The Candy Man’, her hard hitting debut film on child abuse won her two ‘Best Director’ awards in India (2009, 2010) and also got nominated at Barcelona International Film Festival and the New York Short film Festival in 2010.