Lights Out

I was sitting in the rocker reading Gabriel his beautiful new edition of Goodnight Moon (thanks Tia Sandie) for the first time yesterday around 4 pm. Jav had run out to mail some stuff. We had just finished the book and were sitting very quietly listening to the rain, when a huge flash and the loudest pop I've ever heard seemingly hit right outside his bedroom window. It was like an explosion. Then the power went out. I went to let the dogs in, thinking that something outside might even be on fire. I looked outside and didn't see any flames or smoke, and breathed a sigh of relief. As I was trying to calm my way-too-rapid pulse, two freaked out dogs, several nervous cats and one slightly fussy baby, I busied myself with stumbling all over the house to find first a flashlight, then the electric bill so that I could call to report an outage, then my cell phone. While I was on the ridiculously long call, where I was finally told they knew about the outage and power would be restored by 6 (only an estimate, of course), the city siren started going off.

Well, last time we had a bad storm and that happened, Jav and I realized that we have no inside room to hide out in if a tornado ever is coming our way. We have one tiny hall closet, and the larger closet in Gabriel's room. That's it. So first of all, how are we going to fit humans and pets in these spaces? Secondly, how do you catch four cats when they know you are freaked out so they have decided to hide in places in your house that you don't even know exist? It dawned on me yesterday that all we can really do is pray that it never happens.

I called my parents to find out why the siren was going off, and by then Jav was home. We called George and Billie next door, and found out their power was on. We could see that everyone across the street still had power. We lit candles and prepared for a long night, figuring that the power company had bigger problems to fix other than our one little house. Gabriel fell asleep early (6), and we were sure he wouldn't last long without the dull roar of his humidifier. But the wonderful repair guys showed up around 7pm. They said they had to go into our backyard to see what happened and hopefully fix it. So while I tried to distract two dogs very quietly from noticing that strangers were trampling all over their territory, the men very quickly determined where the lightning had hit (where the line from the pole attaches to our house) and fixed it. Truly heroic people, who travel around in lightning and rain to fix other people's electrical problems. Whatever they make, it isn't enough.

"I am a lineman for the county..." It's going on my Ipod tomorrow.