Our power went out Saturday morning around 3:15 am. Howling winds, lightning cracks and lawn furniture blowing around sent us all heading to the basement with a flashlight. Eventually when the storm finally passed - darkness was coupled with eerie silence. No A/C, no fans, no hummmmm or buzzzz of anything electronic. Nothing.   

I couldn’t sleep so my thoughts turned to the contents of our refrigerator. (actually - that’s a pretty common occurence these days). But what would I really need to replace if this outage went on too long? I have to have my Edy’s Frozen Fruit Lime Bars (this weeks craving of choice). Whole milk for Ben, we could always get more at the store. Should I run up to the store and get ice for the cooler? Then I thought of the breastfeeding mothers out there. My sincere condolences to any of you who lost your frozen stash of hard earned pumped milk due to the power outage. That would be a painful loss.

Then I started worrying - what to do with a toddler on a sultry 90 + degree Saturday with no A/C, no fans, and no cold milk. Should we go to a pool, a mall? Was the outage going to last for a few hours or a few days? Finally fell asleep and awoke to the loud shrill electric zzzzzzzz of August cicadas. Nope, still no power. Peter’s painful loss that morning? - no coffee.

We didn’t know the extent of the storm with no radio, tv, phone or internet. But I was grateful for some welcome connection to the outside world sitting on our doorstep. The morning paper.  I happened upon this incredibly touching and sweet story of siblings in Saturday’s Source.

All of my sleepless fretting was for naught. Our power blared on at about 11 am that morning. Jubilation! 

I know everyone in the metro was not so fortunate. So, what do you do with little ones during a power outage on a very hot day -  or how have you dealt with it in the past?

This entry was posted on Monday, August 13th, 2007 at 9:00 am and is filed under Family Life, Main, Parenting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.