When the Lights Went Off

In observance of Earth Hour on March 29, the world turned off its lights for 60 minutes. We happened to be in Serendra at The Fort for dinner. We had just picked up JR from school.

“Do you now the significance of this day?” JR asked.

“Earth Hour!” I replied.

“It’s our last day in law school,” JR said, referring to the three of us. Then he reminded us how, four years ago, he, Tony and I were busy preparing for his four-year “exodus” from home.

For several weekends, the trio of dad, mom, and son went round and round looking for a condo unit near his new school. And in all of four years, we had to schedule our lives around his comings and goings. Home on weekends with dirty laundry and a stack of law books, back to the condo on Mondays with clean linens and a whole week worth of food.

“It isn’t our last day,” I insisted. “It’s six months to the bar exams.”

Well, it was as good a time as any to celebrate. JR has survived four grueling years by God’s glorious grace. So we entered Balducci, an Italian restaurant where we had, ooops the lights went off!

We could hardly see the carpaccio for antipasto, and the main entrée—pasta with truffles, pasta with clams, and roasted chicken. (My photos don't do them justice.)

“Definitely not inedible,” JC would say if he were around, but he was busy at work; we missed him.

From there, we walked off all that heavy stuff to the end of the long Serendra stretch and what do you know, Tony bumped into Elvis!

When twins meet, they simply have to pose for posterity. It was dark—half of the common lights were still off—but nothing ever stops my husband from an Elvis moment.

So where were you when the lights went off?