I hear the rains down in Africa

An evocative and beautiful blog post today from photographer Mark Deeble: Raindrops in the dust, about the first storm in months coming to Tsavo in Kenya. His description of how things come to life in the aftermath (the baby leopard tortoises!) is amazing -- right up there with the best of the nature writers.

I started following Mark's blog after I saw some of his photographs and read his piece on Satao, last of the big tuskers. My grandparents loved Africa; they went on safari to Kenya several times, and one of my treasured possessions is a photocopied set of my grandmother's letters home to her daughters (my mom and two younger sisters) during a trip in the 1950s.

So I have a soft spot in my heart for the wildlife there, not just because they're beautiful and so, so precariously balanced on the edge of extinction, but also because they make me think of my grandparents. Mark's blog is a wonderful way to feel like I'm really there.