Several vans with uniformed crews from the electric-power company are rumbling in front of our building in Reading. From time to time, a pneumatic hammer can be heard. It often rattles without interruption for a long while. They must be breaking through a lot of concrete. Something is seriously wrong with our power supply. It was cut by mid-morning, and we will be lucky if we get it back before midnight. My mother and I spent the evening by candlelight. As I write, a candle is burning evenly on the low table at which I am sitting in my room. A notebook replaces my computer. Beside a glass of red wine, there is a tray on the table with a burning stick of incense. My room is in the back of the house, which means that I am sheltered a bit from the rattle on the street. Most likely I will go to sleep before the power is restored, but I am almost sure the troubles with electricity will be a distant memory even tomorrow morning, when I will get up to go to work. Or will they? Will I not keep returning to this cozy moment, this warm light, this tender solitude? Am I not relishing the memory of the power cut already?