Yep, the title of this post is nicked from the Bee Gees‘ own follow-up album to Saturday Night Fever. Kinda lame album cover, dontcha think - very ’70’s-ish, eh? OK, so the title of this post lacks creativity, but no one ever accused The Great White Shank of being that creative. After this post, I hope you’ll understand why…

Last night, I was sitting on the couch and minding my own business, enjoying watching the Red Sox treat Pedro Martinez and the New York Mets to an old-fashioned, “Welcome-back Petey!” whupping. Tracey was in her usual place at that time of day - in the office with the rabbits, using our $2K+ computer in its primary role (a solitaire game). I had just finished supper and had nothing on my mind other than anticipating Youk getting another hit (which he ultimately did!), when all of a sudden the strongest scent of Easter lillies overwhelmed me. As strong as if I were back at St. Anne’s Episcopal on Easter Sunday. Then, not seconds later, it was gone. Completely.

Immediately, I checked the clock - it 7:22 PM AZ time. The reason I checked was just in case I later found out someone I knew or was close to had died - then I could ask what their time of death was and see if it was one of those spooky Twilight Zone-kinda things. Where could the scent have come from? There was no need to see if it had come from outside - there’s no such thing as an open window or door here in Arizona come late June; heck, the temp was still over 100 at that time. I checked around the corner, and there was Tracey, still absorbed in her game. I knew we had no flowers or even scented candles in the house, so that wasn’t the cause.

The odd thing was, for that brief moment in time, the Sox seemed a million miles away, and I was left with a soft, lingering sense of emptiness - not calm, not sadness, not joy, just the kind of emptiness one feels when someone has left the house and all is suddenly quiet.

Very strange.