This time last Thursday here in Raleigh, North Carolina, we were bracing for what was predicted to be a devastating hurricane. There had been days of warnings, which meant that all the bread and milk was sold out of most supermarkets (which is an odd phenomenon, I mean, what does everyone DO with large quantities of both during a storm that they don’t do at other times??), batteries were in short supply, as were generators, battery-powered lights, and bottled water. Everyone watched the weather updates to see where the storm was predicted to make landfall, what the top speed winds were going to be, and how much rain we’d get over how long a period of time. As the storm grew closer, the forecast track made it pretty clear that Raleigh would not get a ‘direct hit,’ but would be subject to high winds and many inches of rain over at least 4 days.

So, yes, we bought bread (one loaf, as usual!), made sure we had flashlights, batteries, charged our electronics, and otherwise prepared the house for the storm. Then we waited. And waited. We had rain and high winds, but nothing dramatic.

And then the power went out on Friday evening.

It’s amazing how quiet and still everything is when there isn’t the constant background hum of things powered by electricity. Now, we could clearly hear the staccato music of the rain pelting the windows, and the wind whipping the tree branches. In our powerless cocoon, we settled down to read by the light of our Kindles, with some still-cold wine at our sides (a must, for any storm situation!). Later, we used our storm radio to keep track of what was happening outside of our area, and learned that areas to our east and south were getting the brunt of the storm with much fiercer winds and torrential rains.

But for us, there was the quiet.

We dined by battery-powered candlelight which was lovely.

And then, just as we were getting used to not having electricity, it returned.

Back was the hum, back was the air movement created by fans and the air conditioning; we were back to normal. We were thankful to have only been without power for 3 hours—others are still without it, and have had their homes, vehicles, properties, and businesses ruined—we know we were extremely lucky—this time.

‘Hoping you can find the quiet within the storm of your daily life.

Until next time,

MDP