Storm

I didn't get a picture of the lightning (or the thunder, for that matter) but we had both yesterday. They're rarities around here. I welcome them, calamities that they may seem to be. Or nature's thrills, if you'd rather.

It was a respectable storm. Nothing terrifying, but not a piddle. Kind of refreshing, like a glass of ice-water on a summer's day.

The last time John and I were in Illinois we got caught in a prairie rumbler the likes of which frightens even the locals. We were driving from DeKalb to Chicago, or at least we were trying to. The storm was so feral we had to pull over and wait for it to pass, and hope it didn't notice us. You can't see to drive in a storm like that, no matter how frantically your windshield wipers wham. Because the water does not fall in drops, it does not fall in sheets or blankets or even torrents but in thick gobs, poured from the sky's pitchers by wild giants who don't care what they hit. It's ice-water, though not so refreshing when it's beating on you like that.

But it's beautiful to see as it rolls over the plains, dark and cruel as only an unconscious thing can be. As long as your defroster is working and you get a good viewing spot under the overpass, there's no show like it.