Sick with a major cold that has settled in my ears and throat now, I spent yesterday curled up in bed with dogs and tea, alternately napping and surfing the web from my trusty laptop. At times, I flipped the television on, but it was a “500 channels and nothing to watch” sort of day, and anyway, there was entertainment provided free by Mother Nature herself.

Wednesday had been a grey day, but in the soft, innocent sort of way that basically makes you feel as if the entire world is wrapped in pale greyish-lavender candy-floss. Yesterday was aggressively grey, and the rain showed up accompanied by a symphony of wind, thunder, and lightning, as well as its own sound – the slick staccato of drops falling on the deck, on the glass table, different pitches melding together, or the soft hiss of the water landing in the pool, sounding for all the world like a simmering cauldron.

And the lightning, oh, the lightning.

I love lightning, and one of the things I love about living where I do is that we get amazing, tremendous lightning storms. Yesterday was not disappointing. I remember crossing the living room, lit by only the Christmas tree and the bannister lights (which will remain until Epiphany), and turning my head to see long fingers of Dracula lightning arcing across the sky, not once, but three times in succession.

Another time, I’d have been awe-struck, and stopped just to watch, but yesterday I laughed. We have a wreath on the front door that has a motion detector. When someone stands in front of it, it begins to dance and sing “It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas,” and, like something from a horror movie where a child’s toy plays innocently just before the axe murderer comes, each flash of lightning was triggering the wreath.

The dogs did not like any of this.
And my head and throat were achey, still are achey, so I returned to bed, and cuddled them, soothing Cleo so that she stopped barking at the thunder. She finally burrowed under the covers where she was mostly oblivious to the lightning, at least.

And I?
I turned out the lights, lit candles, and watched the flashes of light in the sky until sleep claimed me again.