Storm
Darkness. Windows open. A humid breeze waves the room's curtains. Through the open window the sound of heavy rain. Water is rushing through the eavestroughs and down the downspouts. Drops splash into just formed puddles. The swish of car tires displacing water on the black asphalt roads. Headlights dimmed by the fury. The sodium-vapour orange street lamps appear shrouded in a halo of fog - rather it is the veil and drape of solid rain. The water is rushing along the sides of the roads towards the storm sewers. Water levels are rising.
Whitish blue flashes of light. Billion-watt flash bulbs going off every few seconds. Allowing us to take a mental picture of the landscape beyond the window. Silhouetted trees, branches swinging. Telephone, cable and electric service cables looking dangerously exposed, drooped between their trunk poles. The piercing, cutting crack of a long thunder bolt cutting across the sky. That split second moment before it is unleashed. The anticipation we feel as we await the sound. The reverberation and echo that follows it.
The sound of the rain diminishes. Drops are falling from the trees and eaves. The last rivulets are finding their ways to the lake. The air is lighter and cooler and is infused with the smell of the wet earth. You can smell the dark, black mineral-rich soil.
It is quieter now. No cars are on the roads. Everyone is indoors. The storm has passed.
The sound of the refrigerator has re-emerged from the filter that had been created by the storm. The planes are flying again. Man made comforts re-emerge. Their importance re-elevated. For twenty minutes they were not important. We just watched, listened, smelt and felt. We remembered how. Now we'll forget again...until nature awes us with some other sight.
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