I must admit that this is the first of my blog posts that actually began as a hand-written journal entry…the combined result of boredom and wanting to get my thoughts down on paper. Actually, if it had been up to me, I would have preferred to type them, but since that wasn’t an option, the next best thing was sitting on my patio in the cool summer evening (as opposed to inside my sweltering apartment), jotting down everything that popped into my head under the subtle glow of the street lights and my hand-held flashlight.
So, let’s go back to last week when all of the earthquake/hurricane buzz began…
For most of the week, the topic of conversation on the news and by the water cooler was focused on Tuesday’s earthquake and Hurricane Irene’s impending path of destruction. Admittedly, I’m not usually one to freak out about acts of nature…I’m not sure why that is exactly. Goodness knows I worry about the safety of my family and friends on a daily basis, but for some reason, I just don’t take naturally disasters as seriously as I should. That being said, I’d pretty much shrugged off all of the warnings about how terrible Irene was going to be. Not to mention the fact that when lots of people in my office were freaking out about the earthquake, I probably wouldn’t have even evacuated the building if it weren’t for the fact that I’m a zone warden for my section and felt kind of obligated to leave with everyone else, since it’s part of my responsibility to make sure they all get out safely, but I digress…
On Thursday night, I was enjoying a fabulous dinner with some wonderful friends before we started a planning meeting for our new YPG alumni group (SO excited about this, btw!). During dinner conversation, someone mentioned the hurricane and how Richmond would almost certainly lose power on Saturday. Having tuned out most of the recent weather forecasts and hurricane preparedness lectures up to this point, I was a bit taken aback by my friend’s comment. “Wait…are you serious?!” I inquired, wide eyed and finally interested in the hurricane talk.
“Oh yeah, it’s going to be bad. You should definitely make sure you stock up on bottled water, flashlights, batteries, etc.”
Now, we’ve been hit by plenty of hurricanes and floods back in the Valley over my lifetime, so I’m used to people taking precautionary measures to prepare for the storm…except back home, my parents and my big bro always took care of everything so I never really had to worry about it. (Events like this make me realize how many things I’ve taken for granted over the years….I know it’s too late to tell Dad now, but Mom and Jon, if you’re reading…thanks a MILLION for everything!!!! Love you guys!!!!).
Even back at JMU, I’m sure we had some bad storms during hurricane season (although snowstorms are the only thing that really comes to mind right now), but we never experienced anything bad enough where we lost power at our townhouse for any extended period of time. So, after pondering on this later and discussing with co-workers how terrible it was predicted to be, I finally started thinking that maybe I should take this thing seriously. However, then I heard that some of the Martin’s stores had already sold out of bottled water, and I didn’t want to buy anything perishable that would go bad in the event of a power outage, so I decided to avoid the supermarket crowds and stayed home on Friday evening. My version of hurricane prep included filling up two empty water bottles and freezing them so I could throw them in a cooler to keep my carton of milk cold for a few hours if need be. After all, no power outage could possibly last longer than just a few hours, right???
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| My living room fireplace in the candlelight on Saturday night |
Around 3:15 on Saturday afternoon, after 3 close calls of the lights flickering off and back on again, they finally flickered off….and didn’t come back on this time. My roommate and I each respectively exclaimed “Oh man!!!!” and “Nooo!!!!” With the storm raging outside, the sky was quite overcast, so we both pulled ourselves away from our laptops (which were now essentially useless, since the FiOs router needs power in order to function, which didn’t dawn on me until later when I wondered why Wi-Fi wasn’t working on my Blackberry, but thankfully my data plan was still running strong lol), and relocated to the living room to read by the window. At first, I kind of welcomed the quiet opportunity to delve further into The Help, which I was already slightly over halfway through at this point. So for the next several hours, I read and read some more, with the occasional facebook check to see how many others had also lost power.As it started getting dark, I only had 60 pages left in my book and was determined to find out how things turned out for Miss Skeeter, Abileen, and the other characters. I strained to keep reading by the window, but eventually decided this would be a good time for dinner. So I grabbed a bag of pita chips and reached in the fridge for a container of my fave Trader Joe’s red pepper hummus and a cup of pomegranate yogurt. So much for a well-balanced dinner, but at least I figured the hummus and yogurt would be two less items to potentially spoil in the fridge. Once I finished munching on those, it was almost pitch black in the apartment, so my roomie and I started lighting lots of candles (for once, my obsession with decorative and scented candles turned out to actually be useful!). Not ready to start reading by flashlight just yet, I took the opportunity to have a quick phone convo with Mom, then texted some close friends to see how they were faring thus far in the dark. I finally pulled out my mini-flashlight (this experience has taught me that I should probably invest in a legit flashlight in the event that something like this happens again, but I guess I will have to wait for Target to get restocked haha). I finished reading The Help, which I highly recommend, by the way! If nothing else came out of it, at least the power outage forced me to devote an entire day to reading, so now I can go see the movie this week…
After checking facebook and email one last time, I finally decided around 12:30 that maybe I should just attempt to go to bed and when I woke up, it would be light outside. Thankfully, my iPod was almost fully charged, so I crawled into bed and started listening to my favorite tunes while thinking about the memories that each song evoked in my head. Not one to ever go to bed early, my body was clearly not willing to adapt to this new bedtime, so I proceeded to listen to music while tossing and turning until I finally drifted off to sleep sometime after 2:30 am.
I awoke on Sunday morning to an absolutely gorgeous day as sunshine streamed through my bedroom windows. After quickly realizing that the power still hadn't been restored, my roomie and I decided to take a walk around the Fan to assess the damage. There were several blocks that looked just fine...lights were on inside the houses and the only evidence of the storm was the debris and leaves that covered the sidewalks. Unfortunately, others didn't fare quite so well. We saw several cars crushed under fallen trees, as well as a row house with a tree through the roof :( After this, I decided to try my luck by venturing Downtown (and safely crossing intersections where the stoplights weren't working along the way) to see whether my office had power (and thus ice in the ice maker!). To my pleasant surprise, all looked normal Downtown, so I was able to fill up a cooler full of ice and salvage several items from my fridge, all while charging my lifeline to the world so it would last me for the duration of the day.
I headed off to City Church at 4:00 and felt a sense of calm come over me during the service, as it helped me stop focusing on the power outage and realize that I didn't really have it so bad after all. We had a Vespers dinner afterward, so it was nice to finally eat some warm food in the company of new friends. Upon returning home, the power was still out and I settled in for another night of reading by candlelight. Luckily, the Starbucks down the street had power, so I got my caffeine fix with a grande skinny iced caramel macchiato and was able to do some reading under normal lighting conditions. The temperature had cooled down considerably by this point, so the roomie and I decided to get a reprieve from the stuffy apartment by spending the rest of the evening sitting on the patio and having a super long gab session under the glow of the streetlights (during which time I jotted down the highlights of this blog post).
This morning, I made it to work on time after taking what I'm sure was the coldest (and thus fastest) shower of my life, and also after starting on the dreaded task of cleaning out my freezer/fridge. I figured it was better to tackle it this morning before too much started leaking out than waiting until after work and coming home to a serious mess. And hey, who knows, maybe, just maybe, the power will be back on by the time I head home from work today.
To give you one last snapshot of my hurricane and post-hurricane experience, I figure nothing says it better than my collage of facebook status updates during the weekend. I have compiled them below in chronological order for your hopeful entertainment :)
Who else needs some peppiness to distract from this dreary hurricane?! I sure do! Thinking about "brighter days" sure seems appropriate! Enjoy! :)
MercyMe's new song "Move". It's from their new album "The Generous Mr. Lovewell" which will be released May 4, 2010. Lyrics: I'm not about to give up Because...
I would not have survived as a pioneer haha. But on the upside, I only have 60 pages left of The Help! Let's see how much I can get through b4 busting out a flashlight...
Bake for 1 hour. Check with a toothpick or fork to make sure the cake is done.
Transfer to a wire rack, let the cake cool for at least 30 minutes, then frost and enjoy! :)
