It came, it went

Hurricane Irene came, huffed and puffed, left a mess like a two year old having a tantrum and left.

We on Cape Cod got only wind. Of course, since the place is full of trees, limbs, big and small, came down, so the electricity went off -- about 2 P.M. and came on at 5:30 A.M. That's it. A dim night, candles and book light did the trick but it was an early to be night. Which meant a early to wake morning -- very early. At 3 A.M. the silence was profound, the darkness deep, and when I went out to see if I could see anything amiss what I saw was a sky full of brilliant stars -- even a quick glimpse of a shooting star. With no ambient interference I could gaze at the sky in its magnificence as people used to see it before electricity.

I went back to bed and lay awake some time pondering a morning headline, "Thousands lose power." By then it was hundreds of thousands ... Power became metaphor as well as technological fact. Power to see in the dark, power to cook, to keep food cold, to entertain themselves at home [except for the many battery run gadgets] And many other kinds of power that are taken for granted. A so-called "life style" we think we need but which our ancestors lived without. We regained power to see the stars, hear crickets, know silence. Forced out of routines, some of us reflect on essentials and that we are powerless to live the life we think is ours without the power of electricity.