Midnight Thunderstorm

The clock says it’s midnight so you did get a few hours of sleep after going to bed early. Still, it’s annoying that the lightning awakens you. You’ve never been one to sleep through thunderstorms or anything else, really. Some people say the rain makes it easier to sleep but it just keeps you up.

Earlier you thought it would rain because it got cloudier and darker well ahead of the sunset. The clouds were building to the north and west with big gray ripples within them, the sign of some great cold front arching its back over the region. The front moved in slowly and that means it would move out slowly, with the storm drawing out its thunder as long as possible. At bedtime, there were only a few flashes of lightning in the sky, vague enough to be mistaken for car headlights turning on the street outside, too far away for thunder to trouble itself.

Just about midnight and you wonder why if you awaken at night at all, it is always just about on the hour. Is it because bedtime is so regimented on these work nights? For years you have wondered when you awaken for the storm, is it because your body somehow senses the disturbance moving eastward or did some peal of thunder shock you awake?

At first the lightning is just a few weak flashes and you’re groggy enough that you can roll over and go back to sleep. Dreams and lightning merge so the lightning is in your dreams and you feel like you’re dreaming as the flash cubes of light awaken you. The dream at first seems alarming. A moment after awakening it just seems stupid. A moment after that and it’s forgotten altogether.

The rain starts dripping a warning and then all at once bangs down on the awning with all its force. You’re just about awake now. You figure you might as well check out the light show but in the rainy midnight haze you can’t see the individual bolts and it’s just an uninteresting sheet of white. You could get some writing done but what seems brilliant when you’re half-asleep would just seem laughable in the daytime.

You’re just about awake and the day’s troubles begin to trouble you. Bills, chores, deadlines, real estate and the vague maw of the future open up and throw a baby’s tantrum at you with the thunder some clichéd soundtrack for dread.

Why does the thunder have a specific sound? Tonight it sounds like a plastic recycling can banging on a metal trashcan a few driveways over. Maybe the air quality and distance affect the sound. The lightning is constant now, piercing your eyelids. It’s been a half hour and though you love thunderstorms, you wish it would pick a more convenient hour when you could enjoy it.

Somehow you sleep again. Just after 2 a.m., you awake again, amazed that there is still some remnant of lightning flashing in the eastern sky. You wonder when the storm will get to the ocean.

A few hours later, the sound of the shower awakens you earlier than normal. On the one morning when you could have slept a little later, you have to be up early for a dentist appointment. It’s Monday.