Eerie

Here I am, sitting on the couch with the television off, the front door open, and the deep calm of steady rain helping me forget. Indeed, I contemplate writing about that very thing: how the actual sound of rain falling just outside my door and the cool breeze being drawn inside by the whole house fan combine to create a peace much more tangible than the app advertised on tv. And then, just like that, my calm evening transforms into an eerie one.

Lightning is flashing in the distance, but there is no thunder. My reverie is disturbed by a deep rumbling that I feel before even hearing it. It sounded like a massive diesel engine – one belonging to a very heavy truck, probably a fire engine. But it sounded like it was moving slowly. I raised my head and sure enough, the raindrops splattered on our windows cast kaleidoscopic red flashes as the whirling lights of a fire engine practically creeping toward our house illuminated the trees arcing over the rain soaked roadway.

Silence

Other than the ground-shaking vibrations of the vehicle itself, the behemoth was silent. The rotating lights chased each other across my neighbor’s lawn and into the woods across the road, and I imagined the firemen leaning forward in their seats to read the numbers on our mailboxes. What else would cause them to drive up our road ever so slowly, yet silently, with lights flashing? Lights that could surely awaken any light sleepers among us.

For a moment, I thought in a panic, “Are they looking for us? Do I smell smoke?” Weird how you can question your own perceptions when confronted with an experience you’re totally not expecting. “Oh my God! What if one of our neighbors was struck by lightning?!”

I tossed my laptop aside and darted outside, hastily unlatching the screen door to see if they were going to stop at our next door neighbors’ home. No, they kept going and eventually made their way to the end of our road, where I thought I saw them turn their lights off.

False alarm.

Settling Back In

Settling myself back on the sofa, I realized how much my train of thought (and peace of mind) had been thrown off by the passing of the eerie fire engine. I logged back in (because of course the laptop had gone into sleep mode as I investigated this odd event) and started contemplating yet again the subject of tonight’s post, the blessing of a steady rainstorm, when all of a sudden I felt the approach, once again, of the lumbering beast.

What? They’d actually turned the fire engine around at the intersection, only to make another flashing light pass up our road again?

Tossing my laptop aside, I ran to the front door only to witness, yet again, this massive engine creeping slowly along our road. Suddenly, just past our house, the driver put the metal to the pedal and picked up speed. I darted outside to see whether it turned toward High Rocks or the river, but the branches of our trees are now so thick with life that the truck – and the lights – disappeared from my view almost immediately.

No Sirens

I never did hear sirens. The fire engine never passed our way again – at least not yet. Not in the time it’s taken me to write this post.

But the rain has subsided and all I hear now is the rushing of the water in the tiny creek across the road that always flows fast when we have a lot of rain. It’s not overflowing, but it is running fast.

The silence of the fire engine juxtaposed with the urgency of the flashing lights was weird and unsettling. Eerie, in an odd sort of way.

It’s hard to explain. Perhaps it’s just a sign of the times.

(T-540)