Rain Rain, I might have to go Away.

As I listen to the rain pour down through the gutter and see only gloom from my window, I am sorely tempted to move away from the people that I love.  That's what holds me to Washington.  I would miss the mountains (after 7 1/2 years of  living here I can finally admit that), the idea of being near to the ocean (we've only been three times in the 7 1/2 years we've lived here-- a complete and utter travesty), I would miss the wind blowing through the pine trees behind my house and watching them sway back and forth hypnotically, the excellent schools, and I would miss living in a place others come to vacation.  I would miss those things, but probably not mourn their loss.
I know that if we were to move away from here, I would cry every day for a long time from the pain of missing the people that I have grown to love.  It would not be the adventure that I saw before me when we moved from family in Idaho.  We didn't have a lot of really close friends there and family is family; no matter where you move, they seem to find a way to track you down and keep you close.  Over the years, there have been mass exoduses by friends who have returned home to family in Utah or gotten better jobs somewhere else.  Some of those friends are still holes in my heart, since I can't see them all of the time.  Facebook helps.
But this rain, this Noah's ark deluge, is getting me down.  I literally feel it down in my bones.  Despite what the rheumatologist says, the cold and wet adversely affect me and medicine is not enough to keep the pain at bay.  I keep thinking back to Idaho this summer and how there was no pain.  I sat on a concrete slab for an hour and a half every week day for two weeks and there was no pain.  Sitting on the couch makes me groan now.  Sleeping in one of my parent's crappy guest beds and there was no pain.  Sleeping in my Sleep Number bed and I toss all night.  The other night, I couldn't get my pinky to go where I wanted it to.  Crazy!  A  pinky.  But it still scared me, because it was the first sign of something more than just pain.  Ugh!  I don't know how much longer I can deal with this, especially now that I know that it's not just my body getting old and that there is a solution (a very expensive solution).
We're staying.  I can do this.