The Summer Storm (standard:non fiction, 845 words)
Author: red1hols	Added: Aug 08 2002	Views/Reads: 3506/1	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
A Summer Storm that proves that the simple pleasures are best and free.

The summer weather this year has been even more unpredictable than
usual. Yesterday was no exception. 

My day at work had not gone particularly well and I returned home in a
bit of a mood. My parents are staying for a few days and they were 
watching a James Bond film on the TV with my son, so I decided that I 
should take myself away for a touch of isolation therapy by reading a 
book in my bedroom. 

I sat in an inflatable chair in my bedroom. It's big, very pink but
very, very comfortable. After about half an hour, it got too dark to 
read in the natural light, so I got up top turn on the main light. It 
was then that I noticed the flashes of distant lightening. 

Now I really love thunderstorms, there is just something about the
danger of the lightening, the roar of the thunder combining with the 
sounds of heavy rain. Most of all there is the smell of cold rain upon 
hot dry earth and tarmac that draws me to them. 

Long since broken of the habit of going outside to walk in the teeth of
the storm, I moved my inflatable chair up onto the bed, opened the 
windows and turned off the lights. Not that I needed to bother, a few 
moments later the power to the whole neighbourhood went off, plunging 
us all into darkness. 

Climbing up onto my comfy chair, I positioned myself so that one bare
foot poked out of each side of the open window. Slowly the breeze 
through open window increased and sent a wonderful cooling sensation 
over my bare feet and legs. The storm got closer, heading straight 
towards my window. 

Although only a matter of minutes after sunset, the dark clouds, almost
purple under the weight of the promised deluge had plunged everything 
into night. The lack of any streetlights only heightened anticipation 
of the approaching storm. 

Lightening jagged from the clouds. Thick forked blades of white light
first going down to the earth and then a fraction of a second later 
heading back up into the heavy cloud. The cloud itself lit up and 
flickered for a few seconds like a faulty florescent tube. The tension 
built for ten seconds and then the noise of the thunder drifted to my 
ears. A stuttering grumble which slowly decreased in pitch as it became 
a constant bass roar. 

The storm got closer. 

The lightening strikes seemed to increase in frequency and were now
spread across the whole vista from my perch at the window. Whichever 
way I looked, it seemed that the cloud would reward my interest with a 
powerful jolt upon the landscape. The thunder changed too. No longer a 
lazy and stuttering growl, it slowly became loud, resonant cracks, so 
loud and powerful that I would swear that I could feel shock waves 
rustle through my beard. 

The lightening and the thunder slowly became synchronised. As when I was
a child I counted the seconds between the flashes and the roars. When 
it was barely a quarter of a mile from the house, the hairs on my legs 
started to quiver and stand up, excited by the static electricity in 
the air and my growing excitement. 

Then it started to rain. Huge drops of cold rain started to fall. It
looked like a grey sheet was being pulled across the land and sounded 
like the approach of a wildly clapping audience, appreciative of the 
storm. The first big drops of rain hit my feet. To signal my 
appreciation, I wriggled my toes. I was rewarded by that smell. The 
wonderful fresh smell of dry earth and hot tarmac being baptised by 
cold rain. The storm responded by increasing the intensity of the rain, 
causing small rivulets to run down my legs with the sensations of ants. 
I wasn't to weaken, I kept my feet in place. 

Lightening and thunder were now as one. The lightening so bright that my
eyes took a few seconds to adjust back to the gloom. The thunder now so 
loud that it was almost as much felt as heard. I sat back and relished 
the greatest free show that nature can provide. Just when I thought the 
storm had passed, it provided a brief encore. A Lightening flash that 
forked and snaked from left to right to light up the sky like a roadmap 
accompanied by a thunderclap that seemed to rattle the windows. 

All at once the show ended. The lightening now at my back providing only
flashes of light. The thunder returning to it's growling beginnings. At 
once the rain stopped as quickly as it began. The Electricity Company 
restoring the power and raising the houselights as a final signal that 
the show had ended. 

Once I was sure that there was no second encore, I rose to get a towel
to dry both the chair the window ledge and myself. My mother was 
standing in the doorway, open-mouthed. 

All I said was "Mum, I'm not weird, just deep." 


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