Weather

Wednesday 24th September 2008

I'd barely slept a couple of hours when I was woken by an enormous crash. I opened my eyes. A brilliant white light flooded the room, but in less than a second the darkness returned. Somewhere in the distance a low rumbling broke into the stillness of the dark night. It wasn't yet 1am. Another flash of light penetrated the drawn curtains, briefly illuminating the whole room. For some inexplicable reason, I started couunting, 1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...CRASH!!! Before the clamour had died down, the room lit up again. Although my eyes were closed this time, I could still see the ghostly white. 1...2...3...4...5...6...BOOM!!! It was louder this time, and almost simultaneously, another bolt of lightning came. I pulled my duvet (well, duvet cover...it had been too hot for a duvet) over my closed eyes, but the light still fought through. Soon the intervals between light and sound disappeared, and I curled up in my bed, fighting a losing battle to sleep, as the elements bombed the city. Though physcially tired and desperately in need of rest, my mind raced as I imagined V-1s racing through the sky and obliterating the city. I covered my ears with my hands, trying in vain to block out the noise. As I slipped in and out of sleep, a giant carried in a ball of fire shot down from the skies. I curled up tighter as the giant in its mental and irrational anger tore the city apart. Ripping up railway tracks from the ground using them to knock down the surrounding highrises, tearing up pylons and electricty lines to use as clubs and whips. Deafening crackles accompanied by enormous sparks crescendoed into a great percussive fugue...

A cheerful electronic melody made an attempt to fight through the continuous cacophony. It was 6am already. The storm still raged on. The thought of pressing snooze entered my mind, but left almost as soon as it had come. I hadn't managed to sleep through the night, what was the point of trying to have a lie in? I took a book into the living room and sat on the sofa opposite (and furthest way from) the window. The sky was still dark. Every few seconds, a pure white light would illuminate the sky, bouncing off the thick curtains of rain that pushed their way through the air, and revealing the low lying clouds that stretched into eternity. Then without warning, an even whiter, even brighter light would come from some random point in the sky, break through the clouds and fall to the earth, bringing with it the most horrendous and deafening noise. I wondered who had coined the expressions "peal of thunder" and "clap of thunder", had they ever been in a storm? Somewhere in the back of my mind, I heard Asterix screaming "The sky is going to fall on our heads!!!"

[I didn't go to class that day...the storm continued until a bit before midday, and a couple days of heavy torrential rain followed.]