As You Like It: Powerless

Sometimes I fool myself into thinking that I’ve got life all worked out, figured out, and straightened out. Then suddenly I can’t dry my hair or have my morning coffee, can’t turn on the computer to check my mail, can’t even open the garage door to get my car out. When the electricity is off — when I flick switches but nothing comes on but a sudden headache — I’m reminded of how helpless we’ve become without our electric conveniences. We’ve become so dependent on them that we’ve forgotten how to do the most basic things when they’re not available. Our world has gotten too advanced for its own good.

We made it through, but the recent storm still packed a punch. (CFD photo)

Steve and I have been incredibly lucky when it comes to natural disasters. We have never been in the path of floods, fires, tornadoes, earthquakes or tsunamis. We’ve had too much water in the garage, ponds in the back yard, trees down and wasps on the porch, but they’ve all receded in time and have been quickly forgotten. Even with our latest storm, Irene, one of our trees hit a power line, rendering us powerless for the day, but we didn’t have to suffer through a dark week.

I’m not sure when I started becoming so nervous at the threat of a storm. Maybe once we had kids I couldn’t bear for them to be frightened. Or maybe it was just a part of getting older and more anxious. I used to love watching a storm from the other side of a window. Now I can’t bear to watch, imagining the trees falling on the roof or the house floating away. I just want it to be over. And maybe it began when it seemed like everything in the house and my life was being controlled by computers.

Computers were the reason that I let my reason run away with my brains before the year 2000. Remember the Y2K crazies? Everyone was sure that at the stroke of midnight we would all be doomed. Every computer in the world would stop working, locusts would ravage our crops, the earth would crack open, and the four horsemen of the apocalypse would finish us all off. Everything I read warned me to get cracking and stockpile food, water, money, batteries and chocolate. This went on for an entire year until I finally gave in and began collecting bottled water, canned goods and candles, hiding it all in an unused closet. I knew that Steve would laugh hysterically if he knew what I was doing, but I couldn’t help myself — the panic had set in.

On December 31 Steve went to bed early, and Mariel and I sat up to greet the new year. Unfortunately, I hadn’t realized that this night was special for Mariel. She was excited about the new millennium. I ran around the house looking for old noisemakers and funny hats, ginger ale and champagne glasses. We turned on the television to watch the clock ticking everywhere on the globe. Slowly the year 2000 rolled in around the world, with celebrations and fireworks — no locusts, no tsunamis, no apocalypse. Thanks to my clear-eyed little girl, I began to see how ridiculous my fears had been. When Steve found out about my stash the next day, he nearly split his sides laughing.

So when the weather forecasters began churning up the fear machines a week before Irene, I remembered Y2K and all the times when their forecasted deluges had turned into drips. I ignored it all — up until the day when I had to do my food shopping. Then a little bit of the old panic tickled me and I bought a case of water, some candles and went searching for D batteries. The battery wall had been stripped clean. We would have to do without.

I kept hoping that Irene would disappear like the other scares, but this time the forecasters were right. I watched our unwanted guest and wondered how long she would stay. At 11 a.m. I heard the crack. A second later the power blew out. I ran to the window and saw exactly what I expected to see — one of the large willow branches had broken off and hit the power lines. Those beautiful willows have been the bane of our existence since we moved into this house. Every time we have a storm I pray to the goddess of willows.

We spent the dreary day wondering when we would get our power back. I made plans for the food in our freezer and getting to work the next day. I tried to read but couldn’t concentrate, worrying that something else would happen. By 4 p.m. Irene calmed down and began her exit. Then at 6, the NSTAR cherry picker, accompanied by Police Chief Ken Berkowitz, came to cut the limb loose. It was then that I found out that we got our power back so quickly because the senior housing complex next door was blacked out as well. We all stood there watching the limb come down and the power come on.

We were so lucky. No one was hurt and there was no damage to the house. The next day, standing on the train platform, listening to the crowd’s horror stories and realizing that many of them still had no power, I silently thanked whoever had watched over us. And today I bought some D batteries — for next time.

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Posted by Joan Florek Schottenfeld on Sep 7 2011. Filed under As You Like It, Featured Content, Opinion. Both comments and pings are currently closed.