I thought the rain had stopped when I started my run tonight. On my way out of my apartment door, my neighbor came in with her head covered in a scarf.

“Is it raining?”

“What gave it away?” she said.

Well, I thought, I’m going anyway. My girlfriend was coming out too, she was going to go for a walk while I ran.

When we got outside it looked like it had just stopped. It was a little humid and the pavement was wet but I decided to start on one of my favorite Brooklyn runs.

I ran to 4th Avenue to head to Union Street. When I was a block away from Union, it started to rain again, not drizzle, rain. People on the street looked for cover or started to scatter.

I, however, had decided to start running and wasn’t going to turn back (my girlfriend had my keys, anyway). I discovered something, though, running in the rain is awesome. Getting soaked with rain is like sweating, I hate it when I can’t control it but it’s great when I do it on purpose.

I ran all the way to the end of Union street and took a right and started running along Columbia Street towards Brooklyn Bridge Park.

I passed one other runner and the rain started to die down and I noticed another great thing about rain running – you have the streets pretty much to yourself. It’s sort of the same feeling that I’ve talked about before of having to get up early in the morning for a race.

I ran into Brooklyn Bridge Park and people were still playing soccer on the Pier in the rain. I ran around that pier and at the end of it there was a metal basin and someone decided to sit under it until the rain stopped. It looked both like a great solution and a little creepy.

I ran past the pier for basketball and handball courts that has a roof, so people stayed dry. And then I looked across the East River to downtown Manhattan all lit up just after a rain and the lights seemed brighter somehow.

I ran into Pier 3 which is like this little Brooklyn Bridge Park forest and it was amazing. Everything is greener when it’s raining.

Then I ran out of the Park and up the hill to the Promenade and it really started to come down again. You feel like you have the streets to yourself but whenever you pass people you get to wonder, “what the hell are you doing out here? It’s raining.” I passed three teenagers and a young couple who looked less than thrilled to be caught in the rain. I also passed two women out for a stroll with umbrellas.

I ran across Remsen and turned down Court Street. The rain had tapered off again. I ran past the UA Court Street Theater where the big titles were Uncle Drew and Skyscraper. Then across Atlantic past Trader Joe’s, down past where my friends Jon and Kerry used to live. Down to 2nd Pl, across to Smith Street and down 3rd Street over the Gowanus and past the Whole Foods where I scared the hell out of some woman who didn’t know I was coming up behind her because she was wearing headphones.

A year or two ago, I watched the documentary Life Itself about Roger Ebert on Netflix. When it was over, I felt so thankful to have a working body that, even though it was a cold winter day, I went out to run around Prospect Park. The rain run felt the same. It felt good to be outside, getting caught in a warm summer rain.