Turn off the snow, turn on the power

The view from our apartment ... cold!

    We have been powerless for much of Monday and today. We were in the dark for hours, and it's been a test. But we are surviving.

     As I write this, the power has been back on for 20 minutes after the second 12-hour blackout. I have use of my coputer, so I am writing in a hurry because who knows when the power goes out again.

     Spent most of Monday without electrical devices, and again the first part of today.

     So no microwave to heat water for coffee or tea or soup. No television -- which we watched constantly last week and which we depend on for most of our news. For those in our facility who still like to read actual newspapers, no delivery the past two days.

     (It is still a place for the real Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Dallas Morning News, New York Times and Wall Street Journal -- the kind you hold in your hands, not the online versions. I am not one of those readers these days.)

     I don't like snow, and I don't like cold weather. Never have, never will. And it is just too darned cold and too snowy here -- as bad as it's been in our part of the country for, I'm reading, three decades.

     Looked at my phone -- once we were back online Monday evening -- and it said 7 degrees with a "real feel" of minus 6. Last I checked we were not in Green Bay. Today we are up to 18 degrees, a heat wave.

     But, hey, I am not complaining. Please don't take it that way. We are grateful for the dedicated management people and staff in our facility, who made sure that everyone here -- some 450 residents -- had something to eat and drink, twice Monday and again for lunch today.

     They even managed hot soup today.

     Some of those managers and staff spent Sunday night here, and many stayed again last night. And the dining services department also had to deal with a broken water pipe and a partially collapsed ceiling portion in the kitchen.

      Hurray for our management, resident services and dining services departments.

---

     We have residents who voice their gripes, and maybe some are justified. But our feeling is that those in charge of this place, and those who work here, care about us and our well-being.

       It is frustrating not having much to do. I am enjoying typing this message, feels good, feels right.

       We are missing our exercise classes (yes, even at 8 a.m. most weekdays); they were called off. Our Country Store, a convenience for residents that is open from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday, never opened. No power in the exercise room or in the store, obviously.

      Plus, it was cold in our apartment, and it got chillier as the day wore on, although our blankets and afghans were made to good use.

      The good thing was that by raising the blinds in our apartment, the sunshine coming through did help warm it up a bit inside and gave us light. 

       The result was we could read, and I have been able to cover about 175 more pages of this book, which has 589 pages to read in all. It is mostly about politics (I like reading about politics), but thankfully not today's politics.

     (Talk about powerless ... following the impeachment trial last week, watching two completely opposite views, that was definitely beyond our control. But it was great theater.)

      Our power went out -- my guess -- about 2:30 a.m. Monday, came back on at 7:11 a.m. (I know, because I reset a couple of our clocks), just in time for me to go downstairs and bring back two cups of coffee (black), the almost-every-day starter for Ms. Bea.

      That was from the only large container of coffee the dining staff managed to do after the power came on ... until the power went out again.

    That was shortly after 8 a.m. At 8:41 p.m. -- yes, a darned 12-plus hours -- the power came back on. This was after we made several trips down our dark hallway with a flashlight showing us the way. (Early in the day, we made a couple of trips down the stairs, where it was dark enough that we had to be very careful not to stumble.)

      Fortunately, one of the two elevators in our building was operating. Same was true -- one working elevator -- in the two other buildings in our facility. Generators made that possible.

      Today the power went out in the middle of the night, and came back on at 1:41 p.m. One improvement the dining staff was able to make: It had hot coffee in abundant supply downstairs. Beatrice was fine with that, and I was a happy volunteer to bring back two cups.

      Our facility was like the rest of most of our part of Fort Worth, with rolling blackouts imposed to save electricity for most of the past two days.

      Several times I thought about the people who regularly do without electrical power or running water, or so many of our modern conveniences ... or, sadly, without food. That's a significant part of the world, even a significant part of our very city and area. 

      Thought about how blessed, and maybe privileged, we are.

      I know people who grew up in that kind of environment; it hits very close to home. We didn't have a lot in the early 1950s in Amsterdam, but we rarely lacked for what we needed. A little girl growing up in rural North Louisiana didn't have a lot, either.

      "You don't think about it," she'll tell you. "You do with what you have, and you adjust to it. You find a way, and you live the best you can."

      What we did have in Amsterdam in the winter was plenty of snow and cold. For Mom, it likely brought back (bad) memories of a "Death March" she was forced to make in the middle of one of western Europe's most brutal winters a long time ago.

     So when it snows here, in the Deep South's usually mild climate, I always think of my mother, and how she absolutely despised cold weather. When we moved from Amsterdam, she loved the change in weather. Until the rare occasions when it, yes, snowed.

       Mom would have been miserable the past few days. We're not exactly delighted.

        Looking at the weather forcast online, we have a few more days of sub-freezing temperatures, winter storm warnings, more snow possibly late today and likely Wednesday, a slight rise to above-freezing Thursday, a sunny day but still not above 36 degrees Friday, warming up and sunny Saturday and -- gloriously -- temperature highs ranging from 56 to 67 Sunday through next Tuesday. 

     The weekend can't get here fast enough, can it? The abnormally cold weather can't leave fast enough. 

     Got lots that needs to be done: exercise classes, laundry, haircut, grocery shopping.  More Louisiana track and field books to pick up and mail, more to print and have bound.  

     Need electrical power for some of that, need clear and safe roads. 

     The weather is out of our control. What is in our control, the power we do have is mental. It's challenging, but we can deal with it as long as we count our blessings.