A Day in 2010 Without Electricity
PLEASE NOTE: THIS WAS IN 2010. I find it funny, well funny is not the correct word to use, but oh well, funny with how they both grew up without electricity for years. Then when you have had it for so long, I guess you forget how to live without it. I remember these days and nights here at my home without electricity. Not again! I now have a natural gas generator that will turn on in 12 seconds after the power goes off. But then again, that is if it is not another tornado to blow it away also.
To be exact it was twenty-five hours without this wonderful convenience and what a day. The storms started about dark on Saturday night and grew worse. When it was confirmed that the tornado was headed for Geraldine around ten o’clock, I called our good friends who live in downtown Geraldine and they were in bed. As I understand it, it didn’t take them long at all to hit the floor and get dressed. Needless to say the power went off at which point John and I each grabbed a flashlight and headed for the basement. We had little thunder, but the lightning was constant.
We were blessed in that we were not in the direct path of destruction and had no damage. Now I grew up right here on the Windy Knoll without electricity and fared quite well. Electricity came to this farm in 1949 and by then I was already married and living elsewhere. But in those early days, we had never been spoiled with all the modern conveniences and for us it was ordinary living, but no more.
When we got out of bed on Sunday Morning, John began trying to find a way to make a hot cup of coffee – without electricity we have no water. Finally we decided he could heat bottled water on the grill. Our grill has a single burner off to one side and that’s how he made coffee. We always eat cereal in the mornings anyway so that was not a big deal.
One problem we had was when the telephone would ring. We have five telephones in this house; three of them are portable and won’t work without electricity. One we could answer was in the basement and the other in our bedroom – too far away to answer. At midnight on Saturday night John was traipsing (in the rain and dark) to the apartment, located on the side of the barn (this was where we stayed on week ends before John retired) to get an old-timey telephone that works without electricity. However, it was never plugged in at a convenient location, as we often move from the house to the sun porch.
Our Sunday noon meal was cooked on the grill. Sausage, grits and eggs make a very palatable meal.
Of course, John had to make a trip to buy batteries for the now empty flashlights. I knitted and a little company in the afternoon helped entertain us briefly, but we had to find the kerosene lamp, clean the globe, trim the wick and see that it had enough oil to give us a glimmer of light for the night.
By dark, my patience had worn very thin and I called a neighbor, who suggested that I doctor the ailment with salve and a Band-Aid because he had heard we wouldn’t have electricity for a week.
Praises be, the bathroom light came on at 11:30. I whispered a prayer of thanks before I drifted off to sleep in this style of country living.