You and Me Eatin’ Crackers in the Dark

I think a semi truck has helped me realize what marriage will be like.

A few nights ago, I was driving back into Oxford to pick Erica up to eat dinner. We were going to go out to eat, to El Burrito Loco (only the best for us). As I was traveling down the winding road of 73, I realized something was very different. The entire town was blacked out. There were only emergency flood lights, which provided little more than a hint that a building or road might be approaching.

As Erica got into the car, we decided we would just go back to my apartment and wait out the outage. We arrived at the Brillo Pad (my apartment), lit a series of tea light candles left by my old roommate, and proceeded to talk. We were certain that the power would come back on any minute.

Sometimes certainties quickly become fallacies.

2 hours later, we’re still in the dark. We have no heat, no way to obtain food (we’re both assured that we will soon starve to death), and nothing to do. We spend the two hours talking and progressively adding layers of clothes to our chilling bodies.

It’s now been three hours, and we decide we have to eat something. We scout out the dry foods in the kitchen, only to find that crackers are our only option. As some may realize, you’re not supposed to open your refrigerator during a power outage, because moisture will enter and if the power is out long enough, you’ll spoil all of your food. Despite our fathers’ voices in our conscience, we open the refrigerator and grabbed whatever we could. I must admit that despite the fact that ice water was running through my veins, I was only manage to grab some leftover chicken alfredo pasta and a block of cheese.

So there we were. In the dark. Cold. Eating cold leftover pasta, drinking room temperature water, eating crackers and cheese, chatting about nothing….. and loving every minute of it.

We later learned that a semi truck ran into the main power transformer in Oxford, thus knocking out the power for the whole town.

Although it was a little difficult to hear Erica talking toward the end of the night because the earmuffs were muzzling the sound of her voice, I think she said something about hoping that we have a lifetime of these moments. I hope we do, too.