Those of you who follow my blog, Thirty by Thirty, know that I have been making a concentrated effort to rid our pantry of processed food items. It’s been great for our health, but it’s not so good for an emergency. We have very few items around that do not require refrigeration, preparation, or both.
Fortunately, I had already bought a few snacks meant for the drive to New York: about 10 granola bars, some simply fruit roll-ups, and a small bag of animal crackers. Chris came home Friday evening with a couple cases of bottled water and two bags of cheesy popcorn to add to our meager supply of emergency rations.
Unfortunately, it had been so long since any of us had access to processed foods that we polished off both bags of popcorn and most of the animal crackers by Friday evening, a full 24 hours before the storm was expected to hit.
Saturday morning, we began phase one of our storm preparations. We located as many flashlights as we could (2 wind-ups, one from the emergency kit of my car, and Allie’s pumpkin Halloween strobe light). We filled our indoor swimming pool (aka the master bathtub) and the girls’ tub with water, and Chris pulled Allie’s blow up pool into the garage. He also secured his garden as best he could, while I removed all of our non-perishables from the refrigerator (yes--I rescued the coke and placed it in our picnic cooler. If I was going to be out of power and running water, I wanted to make darned sure I would not be out of cold coke).
Then we began phase two: eat as much of our perishable food as possible. We all had big glasses of milk, and Chris took care of the bacon. Allison and I, for our part, made chocolate chip cookies with our remaining butter and some of the eggs. Nicole, having no interest in perishable foods, spent her morning banging on the back door and watching the wind and the rain pour down.
It was only two o’clock when the power blinked for the first time. Thankfully, I had done all the dishes and squeezed in one last shower, so I felt ready for the inevitable power failure. We used our remaining few hours of electricity alternating between watching Strawberry Shortcake and the news and playing card games [No. Sorry, Mommy, but Daddy already took my dolphin. Go fish!]. At 4:45 pm, we lost power abruptly.
Nicole couldn’t care less, but Allison was devastated. She kept pushing the power button on the TV hopefully and switching lights on and off occasionally. “Don’t worry, I’m sure they’ll be working soon,” she asserted.
By 6:00 pm, the wind and rain were really picking up, but because there was no thunder or lightening, the storm wasn’t really bothering the kids. They went to bed with no more fuss than usual and were asleep in no time. We waited a few hours before moving Nicole into her pack n’ play in the hall and Allie on to the blow up bed in our room (the tallest trees are on their side of the house, so we didn’t want them sleeping in their rooms).
Chris and I congratulated ourselves (quietly) on a job well done--it seemed that against all odds we would be getting a good night’s sleep regardless of Irene. We fell asleep happily listening to the combination of wind and pounding rain (it actually sounded just like waves on the Oregon coast). Our elation lasted only until 3 am when Allie woke up. She was so confused, and later so delighted, to find herself in our room that she just couldn’t settle down again. She ended up choosing to have a long ‘quiet time’ in her room by flashlight. It was neither long nor quiet, and nobody got much sleep after that.
By Sunday morning, the rain had stopped and the sun was shining. It was still very windy, but gorgeous out. Despite the extraordinarily fine weather, I was cranky. Lack of sleep and modern conveniences is a bit of a deadly combination. I stomped about with my swiffer sweeper and a bucket of water, alternately muttering under my breath and barking out orders until Chris had the good sense to suggest getting out to assess the damage.
Our property fared really well. The backyard was muddy, but had very few leaves and branches strewn around. One tree fell and landed about three feet from the side of the house, but there was no damage. We decided to venture into town. Some friends of ours were fortunate to have not only power, but an extra freezer, and we set out in the hopes of salvaging some of our more expensive frozen goods.
We took a right out of our driveway and made it around two curves before discovering a large tree, suspended by the power lines, blocking the road. We turned around only to find more trees (and more down lines) blocking our alternate route. Fortunately, there was a church driveway right before the trees, and we were able to get off of Happyland.
We passed dozens more trees that had already been cleared of the roads, and a couple of homes that were not as lucky as ours. It was pretty obvious that the power would be out for some time.
Chris went back to work Monday morning, and the girls and I spent our days bumming showers and AC from friends who already had their power restored. We would meet for dinner after Chris got off work and return home for early bedtimes for the girls.
I missed the drone of the fan at night, which had been replaced by open windows and a loud chorus of cicadas and other creepy-crawlies that some lovingly refer to as ‘night music’. To me, it’s not music at all. I think of it more as the battle cries of millions of many-legged warriors waiting to infiltrate my house and bite me to death. But I am prone to exaggeration.
At 8:30 pm on Wednesday, four days and four hours after losing power, we returned home from dinner to a tiny light by the door of our neighbor’s house. I don’t think I have ever been so excited to see an illuminated doorbell. The song and dance premiere of “We Have Power” was performed enthusiastically.
Allison headed straight for the power button on the TV and was allowed to watch just one show before bed. I put Nicole to bed and then zipped through the house flipping on lights and plugging in everything with a power cord while Chris turned on our water pump. Fifteen minutes later, the washing machine and dishwasher were running, the computer was on, and life as we know it (and prefer it) was back.
Good bye, Irene. Don’t come again!
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