By Jim Hagarty
1986
Monday night about 10:30 I set out from the home of the Bornholm relatives I was visiting, after waiting a while for a break in the torrential rainstorm that struck this area that evening. I turned my car east onto Perth County Road 11, heading for Highway 19, Stratford and home. Though the rain had subsided, the fierce lightning continued and many times over the next 20 minutes the countryside all around me was suddenly blanketed with blue light and the pitch-black sky was stabbed by powerful forks of brightly charged energy.
All in all, as cartoon dog Snoopy likes to write, “It was a dark and stormy night.” Dark, stormy and – scary. I had little doubt my car and I would make it all the way home but the disturbing thought that we might not, that an accident or some mechanical breakdown would leave us stranded by the side of the road, crept into my consciousness and stayed there. It would not have been a nice night to be wandering up and down the roads in search of help. Suddenly my home, my cats, my TV and my bed never seemed so appealing as they did just then. It appeared to be a good time to tell God if he got me home safely, I’d never go out in a storm again.
I was not the only one fleeing the tumult – a big frog bounded across the pavement at one point and a ground hog scurried from north ditch to south. But few other vehicles were out and it was lonely. The radio was no comfort so I shut it off. It was just me, the storm and 18 miles of road to travel.
It never storms in the city. The winds get up and the rain beats down and there’s thunder and a bit of lightning. But there are also street lights to lead the way and coffee shops to duck into and somehow, except, I guess, in cases where a tornado or a hurricane sweeps through an urban area, any terror associated with a real blaster is minimal.
But among my memories of growing up on a farm in the country are dozens of frightening encounters with winds so strong they bent tall trees over like blades of grass, with thunder cracks so loud they shook you from inside out, with lightning so powerful you could hear it sizzle and spark and skies so dark they seemed evil. Those storms were naturally frightening for a child – any child – but they were made even more fearsome by the knowledge that even the adults in the family were afraid of these out-of-control elements. Grownups could shoo away bogeymen, monsters and belligerent dogs but they couldn’t chase away the thunder and it was disturbing to realize there were things out there more powerful than parents.
Nevertheless, that same fear that made it seem like a real good idea to grab the covers and pull them up tight over your head or to find another bed already occupied by someone bigger than yourself and crawl in under their blankets, gave summer storms an aura that translated into excitement for rural folk of all ages. Reminisce with a businessman and he’ll remember booms and busts, recessions and depressions. Old newspapermen recall disasters, elections and famous people who came to town. Teachers think back to brilliants students and troublemakers.
But people from the country remember storms.
There used to be no better evening’s entertainment than a mid-summer cloudburst, an electrical storm or a blizzard in winter. They required numerous trips to the window to survey the scene and all eyes were glued to the drama outside. Candles appeared on the table in the event the hydro went off and everyone huddled together in one room as these were not good times to be off somewhere by yourself. Providing everyone was home and in the house, a terrible storm could be a pretty good time, especially if a friend, neighbour or relative got “stormstayed” overnight. It was usually a big letdown when a storm began blowing itself out and someone who would know these things remarked, “Well, it looks like it’s dying down.” It would be hard to get back to routine, especially if that meant school wouldn’t be cancelled.
I felt a bit of that excitement Monday night when the skies opened up before me as I drove through the storm. But nature, too often, for a city dweller is, well, just downright inconvenient and it was nice to get home.
