Lighting One Candle

It's a strange sensation to lose electrical power in the middle of the night. Already dark and quiet, it might almost pass unnoticed. But I happened to wake at 4 a.m., perhaps missing the whir of the fan. When I glimpsed my darkened bedside clock, the silence suddenly made sense.

It was not just the deprivation of darkness, then, but a deeper lacking. Did I feel it somehow, drifting as we were without power through the night? I think so. My own small reading light seemed an insufficient candle to counter all that darkness. It gave me light enough to read by, though, and the evening was cool enough that I felt drowsy again before long.

Just as I began to drift off, a large truck chugged its way down the street. It was the power company. They were on it. I fell back to sleep lulled by the purr of the big truck's engine.