Iceamageddon

What I learned during a seven-day power outage, the unhappy result of an extraordinarily destructive ice storm, a home nestled among the tall timber and an understaffed rural utility company.

**People really are nicer during a disaster. It’s a cliché, and I have nothing new to add. Just glad it’s true. And I wish people could be this kind all the time.

**Dogs are perfectly fine in commercial establishments. This past week I’ve been spending more time than I’d like to admit at my local Starbucks (warmth, internet, nice bathrooms). And guess who else is here? Dogs. Six or seven or even eight dogs, sitting quietly (and warmly) while their outage-ravaged human companions do what I am doing. The staff has turned a blind eye. We have all kinds of ordinances and policies against this. In Europe dogs accompany their people into coffeehouses, restaurants, clothing – and Europeans seem to be doing just fine.

**Speaking of animals: Cats rule. Our cat, Simon Baker (yes, sorry) disappeared during the worst of the ice storm and stayed out for 48 frigid hours. Huge limbs of oaks and firs were crashing down. We thought he was a goner. But the cat came back.

**Oh. And fish. They hibernate when their fishbowl water dips below 40 degrees. What a great plan.

**When someone asks you how things are going and you tell them your house is 38 degrees and you have no running water and you can’t flush the toilet and you had to throw out everything in the refrigerator, including a tureen of home-made soup, you do NOT want them to tell you about a much worse thing that happened to them. You want them to pat your arm and offer to do your laundry.

**I think it’s okay to feel a little sorry for yourself even though you are a privileged first-world person who is just temporarily experiencing what is actually a minor hardship. I know how fortunate I am, really I do. But I think, as day 7 without power slides into day 8 and the thermometer dips and the tips of my fingers start going numb, that I’ve earned the right to whimper.