Today we report from somewhere on the East Coast, where we have just emerged from several days of anticipation and dire warnings and newscasts about impending Hurricane Sandy, and, less exciting, the hurricane itself. We were told that we should not be fooled by the fact that no one seemed to know, at any given moment, whether it was technically still a hurricane or, possibly, Rush Limbaugh.
If all the media buildup was intended to goad citizens who were in the path of the storm into preparing in a prudent manner, it was pretty successful by most accounts. If all the buildup was intended to produce anxiety, it was hugely successful, at least by our own personal account.
Unlike a lot of storms, we had days to prepare for whatever this one would bring. And, therefore, days to worry. Of course we planned. We made oodles of Ziploc baggies of ice. We prudently stocked critical survival supplies, such as coffee (Hero) and chocolate (Princess). We always plan ahead, so we also made sure to root around until we found several half-used candles and flashlights with batteries of dubious age.
In the end, however, we did NOT lose power, so we can happily stash the candles and flashlights until the next storm, at which time the batteries will be of even MORE dubious age.
The governor told everyone to stay home on the day the storm was supposed to greet us, which we were happy to comply with. If he had told everyone they should take the opportunity to have a long nap, we would have been happy to comply with that too.
We watched soberly, however, as photo after photo of the destruction left by Sandy flashed across the TV screen, and then we saw a dire warning: If the power went out, our local power company might not be aware of it.
Of course we would need to call to let them know. But we thought it might be prudent to address this possibility ahead of time, and considered calling the power company BEFORE the power went out.
Us: Um, hello.
Computerized voice at power company: If your power is out, press or say 1. If you see a downed wire, press or say 2. If you --
Us: Uh, yeah, our power's not out yet, but we just thought you should know that it MIGHT go out, with the storm and all, and --
Computer: I'm sorry, I did not understand that. Did you say your power was out?
Us (louder and slower, as if speaking to someone very old and deaf, or possibly dead): No, we said it MIGHT go out --
Computer: Is this an emergency?
Us: Well, not yet, but it --
Computer: If this is an emergency, please say Yes.
Us: (silence)
Computer: Thank you. Please hang up now so that we can assist those who are having a true emergency.
Us: But --
Computer: Goodbye. (click)
(Loud boom, and everything goes dark.)
Us: Hey, it's an emergency now!
Telephone: (dial tone)
At one point the power did go out, plunging us into darkness. We remained calm; not a muscle twitched, because we were not moving until we had some light, and we could not remember where we had strategically placed the candles and flashlights. It could have been a long night, sitting frozen in place.
Fortunately the power came on after about 10 seconds, but the Hero took the brief outage as a warning sign and promptly turned off his computer before the power went out again and stayed out. He found a candle, matches, and a book, and sat on the couch, ready to be plunged back into the nineteenth century (but without outhouses). I kept working placidly at my computer, and after several minutes with no flickering of the lights the Hero decided that perhaps we were going to remain in the twenty-first century after all, and reluctantly gave up his anticipated reading by candlelight.
After everything was over, and life went about much as usual, we were left to ponder the experience -- mostly, what do we do with all those Ziploc baggies of ice?
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