Describe a memorable event in your life

The event I'll describe is my grandmother's eightieth birthday, which we held at her house about six years ago. It happened in March, and there were maybe forty people there — most of the family, plus neighbours who'd known her for decades. My cousins and I did the cooking, which was the first time the older generation had let us. What made it memorable isn't what you'd expect. It wasn't the food or the speeches. About two hours in, the power went out for the whole street. In a normal year that would have ruined it — no fans, no lights, in March. But somebody found candles, and somebody else moved the tables into the yard, and within twenty minutes it was better than it had been inside. And then the conversations changed. Without lights people stopped taking photos and just talked. My uncle, who barely speaks at family events, told a long story about my grandmother as a young woman that none of us had heard, and I don't think he'd have told it under fluorescent lights with a phone pointed at him. Why do I remember it? Because the thing that went wrong is the reason it worked. I've been to better-organised parties I can't remember at all. That one I could describe hour by hour.