Whenever the tip tap of rain drops fall on my patio or on the roof of my job, any number of mundane things cross my mind. Did I bring an umbrella? What can I do indoors today? Should I put my plants out? I actually like the weather we’ve been having lately. The rain is a rejuvenating element in a city as gritty as ours. It can be refreshing and romantic, captivating and calming.

But Clayton King and his family have no such notions of the pitter-patter of drops from above.

No matter where he is or what he is doing, rain is pain. It invokes memories of watching hard dollars literally going down the drain. His experience over the last few years with storms has meant watching furniture, pictures, and appliances float away. He’s changed carpets, replaced walls and wiring.

If you do this once in the course of home ownership, that would be quite enough for you. But Clayton has done it four times. Others who live near him have done it more . . . some have had to do it less.

Part of his tragedy is that he could not move. His neighborhood became infamous for becoming a marsh after he bought his home and he — and many of his neighbors who suffered the same fate — was told over and over again that help was on the way in the form of a new sewer system. The system was to replace so-called "catch basins" that were put in when the neighborhood was built decades ago.

The "catch basin" is one of those hidden but less than subliminal components of racism that was installed into the infrastructure . . . like those low bridges on the Southern State built to keep us from going to Jones Beach on public transportation. Ever wonder why there are no trains from the Bronx to Queens?

People who don’t live in other parts of the city may ask, "Well, why live there?" or "Why would you put your portable property at risk over and over again?"

Well, as in many parts of our metropolis during its growth, Southeast Queens was a section where we could afford to own our own homes and not be crammed too tightly into the urban landscape. We could have neighbors who weren’t trying to chase us away or burn us out.

But somehow, when the neighborhoods were designed and ultimately built, some engineers didn’t see any reason why an area that was partially under water when construction began would need a normal drainage system . . . just like other parts of the city which were built a hundred years before.

Clayton, who overcame so many other obstacles to run his own business, had no idea the grates on his street were covering nothing more than large, underground moats. Moats that, not unlike those used in ancient times, could work to keep people in as well as out.

Clayton and hundreds of other people had no way of knowing they were the victims of bad planning that would lead to chronic misery when the rain came down heavily or over a prolonged period of time.

If any of those people had bought a car with a brake pedal that looked normal enough but only put pressure on one wheel instead of two or four, due to some engineer’s belief that certain people wouldn’t need it, the manufacturer would be facing millions in liability suits for the damage that resulted.

But instead of trying to work out some kind of reparations with the folks who were affected in Clayton’s neighborhood, the city and state offer loans that put yet another burden on residents.

In this age of lawsuits, why hasn’t there been a class action suit against the city and state for the flooding that became synonymous with a neighborhood?

The new $70 million dollar sewer system has finally arrived, but there is still more work to be done to make it fully effective. It wasn’t set to arrive in Clayton’s neighborhood for another couple years, but it’s one of those rare times when I think I can say with confidence that the media made a difference.

Clayton and his neighbors have seen the images of bobbing possessions many times, but when the rest of the city saw the pictures over and over again, finishing the project early became a priority. And political pressure didn’t hurt either . . . with Juanita Watkins becoming somewhat of a pain in the neck for Claire Schulman, City Hall and the State, obviously for a good reason. Maybe someday soon the rivers will finally stop flowing through the lives of Southeast Queens.