Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Thunderstorm

Early this morning I awoke before dawn to the rumble of distant thunder. In a hypnopompic daze I stumbled to the window and lowered the sash near my bed. As I fell back to sleep the thunder grew louder and rain splattered on the roof. I slept through the rest of the storm, but awoke to a blissful near-silence. Downstairs no refrigerator motor hummed. On the mantle the pendulum clock ticked and tocked, and a bird sang in the distance, but that was all. A few clouds still scudded by overhead, but bright sunlight peeked out now and then.

It was our first thunderstorm of the year. And it was refreshing.

The electricity was still off as I ate my breakfast at 8 o'clock. I was having my first reservations about having installed an on-demand water heater two years ago when the power suddenly came back on.

This month's Ocracoke Newsletter tells how to make a traditional wooden whistle from a myrtle branch. You can read the newsletter here.

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous7:46 AM

    Hypnopompic??! You've been playing "Balderdash" again, haven't you?

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  2. Clem -- Hypnopompic and hypnagogic are two of my favorite words in the english language. But I have to admit that I sometimes get them confused and have to check the dictionary before using them. As I was writing yesterday I thought, "hey I can actually use hypnopompic in today's journal." And so I did.

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