Lights

I'm brewing a morning pot of coffee. I can't believe we still have power.

Last night, we were battening down the hatches and preparing for the worst. The Weather Service was warning of hurricane-force winds (not exactly in Seattle, but it was supposed to get pretty gusty.) The city started opening emergency shelters for victims of power outages and they opened up their Emergency Response center.

And I was having flashbacks to the windstorm two years ago. I remembered how, outside our window, the wind was blowing like we were on the deck of a ship that had sailed into a hurricane. Transformers were exploding outside. Trees were crashing to the ground. It looked vaguely like that Stephen King story, the Mist, what with the apocalypse happening outside our windows. We lost our power around 1 in the morning and didn't get it back for nearly four days.

So this time, we gathered up our flashlights and our blankets. We stocked up on food and bought emergency water for drinking. We wrote down emergency phone numbers and brought up the cooler from downstairs in case our refrigerator went out. And we mentally prepared for a cold, bitter night.

And when the wind started picking up last night, I started getting a knot in the pit of my stomach. And then ... it never happened. The wind never got worse than a stiff breeze. The dangerous winds never materialized for us. The coffee pot's still brewing, the lights are on, the heat is on. Thank goodness.