Yesterday a tornado touched down in our city, only a few miles from where I live. For a lot of people in the world, this is nothing, but this is an extremely rare, if ever, occurrence in my part of the world.
The result was a near city wide power outage.
Now, this has happened before, we’ve had power outages that were extremely long under dire circumstances, such as the ice storm, that was a matter of life and death for many people. I was an able bodied person then and technology was not quite as booming as it is today. Although during one hot August power outage I saw many people wandering around staring disbelievingly at blank phone screens, not knowing what to do.
But being disabled now, such power outages have a whole new meaning.
I stood at the elevators in my apartment complex with several other tenants, one a young woman on crutches, and none of us knew what to do. I had also done grocery shopping and was burdened with my cart, as well as my cane.
The young girl suggested we all go over to the take out place across the street and eat. We just looked at her and she persisted “But I have money!”
We take electricity so for granted that we don’t realize that it isn’t just a convenience, it is our entire way of living. Without it, everything is wiped out.
After walking up 14 flights of stairs part way with my cart (then a nice young man took that up the rest of the way for me), I was now in an apartment, in the dark, with no running water, no way to cook a meal, nor warm my place. I put my food into a warming refrigerator and realized all that food would soon perish. I have canned food – but an electric can opener. I have no water. All the stores in the neighborhood are closed, nothing is functioning at all.
I was totally unprepared. My cell phone was at less than 30% charged. Even fully charged would it outlast a major power outage?
If I go anywhere, I would have to walk down the stairs and take a bus somewhere to buy water, if buses were still running, and then climb back all those stairs hauling a couple of heavy bottles. All very fine if your legs are working properly.
I sit and wait.
Electricity has become our second most valuable resource (water probably tops this) and I wonder if we do enough to protect it. Without electricity, virtually everything comes to a standstill, our entire way of living vanishes, we are lost. You can’t buy anything. You can’t get gas for your car. You can’t charge your phone. It is a very frightening scenario, especially if you are laid low physically.
The power station hit very close to me is just a structure so vulnerable to all the elements, completed exposed. And this small place on a corner of 2 busy streets paralyzed 60% of the city. This makes me a little more nervous.
I don’t profess to know much about how all this works, but I wonder if we could do something to protect this resource a wee bit more as it seems to be a sitting duck.
Meanwhile, the electricity came back on a little over 24 hours later and I have myself a big pot of tea. All is well again.