What seems to be a wet spring-summer season isn’t quite what it appears to be.

After two weeks of overcast, rainy days leading up to canceled fireworks displays on the Fourth and flash flood warnings, you would think that the region would have had a surplus of moisture so far this year. But that wouldn’t be correct.

On Friday the area had recorded 18.10 inches of rain since Jan. 1 — still 3.66 inches below normal rainfall for the year at this date, which is 21.76 inches.

While the area has gotten some rain nearly every day for the past two weeks, the daily amounts haven’t been enough to push us beyond the normal year-to-date rain level, said WHIO-TV meteorologist McCall Vrydaghs.

Dayton International Airport recorded rainfall all but one day in the past two weeks, Vrydaghs said.

Still, it’s a lot better than last year when the state endured a worrisome drought that threatened agriculture.

On this date in 2012, the area had recorded 14.48 inches of rain, or more than seven inches below normal.

Rain is expected to continue to be drawn to the area throughout next week courtesy of a low pressure trough, Vrydaghs said.

But we’re the lucky ones. The West remains stuck on broil and is fighting wildfires and a widening drought as a high pressure zone lingers there. The U.S. Drought Monitor said that so little rain has fallen in parts of Arizona, most of Utah, and most of Nevada, that working animals have perished and fights have broken out due to lack of water.

The National Weather Service said Friday that the persistent flow of tropical air circulating northward will continue to bring a large area of showers and thunderstorms for the next several days from Florida and the Southeast northward across the Tennessee and Ohio Valleys.