Just good story telling

For the first two nights following last Sunday's storms, south Macon was dark. No power, no people on the street to speak of, just eerie. One of our reporters spent both nights out with the cops.

And this is what he saw.

There was a half moon. You could see the stars.

On a hillside in an old Home Depot parking lot, dozens of police officers braced for the unknowns of urban emptiness.

There was nervous chatter. Would there be looters, chaos, the darker it got?

One bluecoat broke the tension.

"Remember," he joked, "I need a 52-inch TV."

A woman rode up wanting to know where to go for candles. Another came searching for a place to sleep.

Across Pio Nono Avenue, the Krispy Kreme, for ages an around-the-clock beacon, sat darker than an old pot of Sanka.

Even the Waffle Houses were closed.

Yet there was a serenity reminiscent of Christmas mornings before daybreak. Just with anxiety getting the better of anticipation.

"You know," a policeman said, "it's a little eerie."

The evening took on the lonely aura of coastline after a hurricane, of a night in the wilderness with no campfire.

Macon had been sent to bed early.

Would it stay tucked in?