The Last Word On Nothing

In 1861, a 45-day-long rainstorm hit California, causing the largest flood in our state’s recorded history. It created an inland lake 300 miles long in the Central Valley, and drowned roughly 200,000 cows. Governor Leland Stanford had to attend his inauguration by rowboat, and the state went bankrupt. In an effort to escape future flood waters Sacramento raised some of its streets by as many as fourteen feet.

That storm was an atmospheric river, like the category 5 storm that barrelled across Northern California last weekend. Atmospheric rivers roar over the Pacific Ocean from Hawaii and can transport more than seven times the volume of the Mississippi in a single storm. One average, California receives most of its yearly precipitation from these massive storms, over a period of 5-15 days. This storm arrived after a record 212 consecutive days without rain, on my dear friend’s wedding day.

The wedding was to be held in Napa Valley at the groom’s mother’s home. The dress code was garden party attire and the color palette was light blue and butter yellow. We arrived a few hours early to help hoist tarps over the outdoor ceremony area and stage the bar in the garage. By noon, a light pattering of rain intensified the sharp scent of the bay laurel that lined the path to the meadow where Pete and I planned to camp that night. As the 2pm ceremony approached, the tarps flapped ominously in the wind, and the sky got darker.

Lauren had asked me to write something about atmospheric rivers for the ceremony, and so the night before the wedding I dug up my old thesis, which is about the history and future of California’s rivers and hydrology. I’d forgotten that I’d interviewed Lauren’s husband-to-be—a professional guide and a kayaker—for it, asking him to talk about the time-honored pastime of judging a river’s flow by eye. “Once you know a run well enough,” he’d told me, “you can judge the flow by the fluffiness or boniness of the trip downriver.” “Fluffy” high water creates a cushioning buffer as it flows over the rocks, forming roiling eddies and large, white-crested waves: in other words, joy.

Things were about to get fluffy in wine country. By the early evening reception, rain was pooling in the tarps and dumping bucketfuls on our heads. Umbrellas, good food, plenty of alcohol, and a sturdy awning over the dance floor kept us warm and the party going strong until who knows when (I was asleep by 11pm, long past my bedtime). It was only early the following morning, as Pete and I tried to sleep in the back of our car, that we felt the full effects of a “cyclone bomb.” To make room for us, I’d moved our stuff into a tent. Bad decision: by 3am, the tent was upside down, its contents soaking wet and topsy turvy, flung across the meadow. 

The next morning was a glorious mess: Wet buttercream frosting, capsized flower vases, sequins strewn across the lawn. Howling winds whipped the tarps and overturned the awnings; clean-up felt like being on the set of The Deadliest Catch, but with better coffee and pastries. As I watched our friends fold chairs, collect beer cans, and gather sopping linens, I thought: You could do worse than to invite a crew of river guides and kayakers to your atmospheric river wedding. They are good at tying knots, and can have absurd amounts of fun in any weather.

The stream that runs through the property was rising fast and with it, our spirits. “Wahooo!” one of the boater dads said to his daughter, pointing to the brimming, singing creek. “Wahoo!!!” she answered, stomping her tiny galoshes. We joined her cheers, celebrating the next generation of atmospheric river-loving people.