While I was writing about today’s phone photos, a bright flash suddenly lit up outside the window, followed by darkness engulfing the house—a power outage. For the first few seconds, my mind was still preoccupied with how to describe the photos, until the UPS started its continuous beeping, making me realize this was a real power outage.
When was the last time I experienced a power outage? I can’t remember. Back in China, we occasionally had brief, unannounced power cuts, but they always recovered quickly, and the only impact was losing half-written code. However, this power outage didn’t seem as optimistic, and it might not be restored tonight.
I rummaged through the house for lighting devices and finally found two headlamps that I use for astrophotography. When the lights turned on, I felt like evolving from a cave-dwelling creature to a civilized human. Yet, the surroundings remained immersed in darkness. This scene brought back memories from my childhood.
The headlamp’s light gradually turned dim and yellow, like a flickering candle. I felt transported back to my childhood, holding a newly lit candle with matches, excitedly running toward the table.
My mother’s voice echoed in my ears, complaining, “Power outage again?” Meanwhile, my father grabbed a flashlight and went outside to check if a fuse had blown. I pulled out the small drawer of the matchbox, preparing to make a candle block with melted wax. Soon after, my father returned, clearly having found no solution to the problem.
Before long, the only sound in the house was me dripping wax into the matchbox. My father held a book close to the candle, straining to read in the flickering light; my mother brought out a bamboo basket with wool and knitting needles, sitting to one side and starting to knit a sweater. The room was filled with warm candlelight, and the dancing shadows made the space feel more lively while maintaining its quiet atmosphere.
A knock on the door broke the silence. As expected, when the door opened, a group of playmates burst in from the darkness, holding different flashlights and making funny faces by shining them upward from under their chins. The somber house was instantly filled with pure children’s laughter. Then, I grabbed my favorite flashlight and joined them in rushing into the darkness outside. Behind us came my mother’s familiar voice: “Come home early, be careful!”
A clap of thunder, and the candle in my hand transformed back into a headlamp, the laughter turned to silence. I still sat in the darkness, my phone screen illuminating my face brightly, the harsh light causing a moment of pain. In my daze, whether the candle block was completed no longer mattered; what lingered in my mind was the taste of childhood life that could never be relived.