Enjoying peace and quiet

Mother Nature definitely had an attitude last night in my little corner of the world. Not only was it the hottest day of the year for us, but during what should have been a "run of the mill" early evening thunderstorm, there was what the paper termed a "micro-burst" of wind (not a tornado because nothing was in a circular pattern). Basically a pocket of 80 mile an hour wind burst through my neighborhood, uprooting trees on almost every street and knocking out power.

Of course with the kids, we tried to bill this as a "great adventure." David, the little "worrier" of our family was very concerned about another storm coming, but I tried to calm his fears as much as possible. We moved a mattress and a sleeping bag downstairs to our living room where it was about 5 degrees cooler than upstairs. Then, we went out driving to try to get our adrenaline laden boys to fall asleep. They finally conked out a little before 10 pm. We carried them in from the car and put them to bed, before getting ready for the night ourselves. Of course, it was warm and uncomfortable and we really didn't get much sleep, but in that middle of the night, I was amazed by the quiet.

There was no hum of a fan or air conditioner. Our windows were open and I could hear the crickets and there was beauty in that. The moon was shining bright and had no competition from streetlights or the blue flicker of television screens or computers. We are so used to all the noise that surrounds us and it was so nice for just a little while to have that peace and quiet.

Of course, I was also very happy this morning when the power came back on. Tonight we are looking forward to a good night sleep in our air conditioned room. We were lucky. Many people around us still don't have power. But while I am reveling in being back to my usual routine, part of me misses the quiet I got to appreciate last night.