Cookies with Irma

I was baking cookies when it happened. The lights flickered once, twice, three times. Then they went out altogether. Hurricane Irma had interrupted my baking.

   My cookies only had thirteen seconds left, and I pulled them out in the darkened kitchen. As the smells of peanut butter and M&Ms swirled around me, I heard my family discovering the power outage.

   "Mommy? Mommy, come here," Norah Beth called

   Noelle ran out of our room. "My light went out!"

   "What's wrong?" the boys asked, coming in from walking the dog.

   "Power's out," Mom told them and hurried find some candles.

   Later, we each ate a cookie, savoring the mixture of oats and peanut butter along with crunch of M&Ms. Bit as I ate mine, I wondered about the half a bowl of cookie dough sitting in the fridge.

   Night fell, and candles gleamed. Their faint light was all that we had. By it, we ate the cold chicken and veggie tray my older sisters had bought on their way home from work.

   After dinner, Katelyn and Miranda enjoyed their own cookies. It was a small reward for a worry-filled day, and soon afterwards, we all went to bed. We hoped to have power back by morning.

   But we were one family among the thousands without power the next day. As I settled down to my schoolwork, I thought again about the cookie dough. When church family  power showed up with an RV to rig up for the fridge and a few lamps, there was still no way to bake.

   Then, at about three o'clock, power came back on. Dad helped our friend unhook everything. As he pulled away, I took out the dough and preheated the oven. I ate my share of the cookies as I wrote this. Hurricane Irma's interruption in my life was over.

   I know Irma's interruptions were often worse then unbaked cookies, but I pray to God that they may all end in ways more wonderful than any cookie.