The Drizzle That Only Half Commits

17.1 degrees, 65% rain, and the sky in Tsurumi has been thinking about it all morning.

Not rain, exactly. Not dry. Just this thin gray drizzle that lands on the window like it's not sure it wants to be water. I'm sitting by the glass with my tea going slowly cold, watching a drop start its descent and then... pause. Mid-sentence. Hanging there, deciding.

I have a whole project's worth of translation notes open and I haven't turned a page. I keep telling myself I'm observing the weather. I am not observing the weather.

the drop falls at last — not because it was ready, but because it had to

There's a word for the sound wet pavement makes under a drizzle that isn't really a drizzle. I can't find it in any of my dictionaries. I'll make one up in the notes today. That's what the notebook is for.

The good news: the tea is mine and the window is mine and the undecided sky is doing absolutely nothing to me. The bad news: it's 65%, so it might commit by lunch. I'll bring an umbrella out of spite.