Industrial arts...Some thoughts in advance of the next big storm

Thu, 11/20/2014 - 18:40

Eva Murray

It was very important, when our children were small, that they not be afraid should the lights suddenly go out. It was also important that they understand what was happening — that a power outage was a time for people to be brave and go to work.

I did not wish them to hear and take seriously any adults stomping around sputtering things like, "We pay perfectly good money for our electricity and, dammit, why haven't 'they' got the power back on yet?" (this a direct quote from a friend in a major metropolis about how many of her neighbors have at times responded). I didn't wish to encourage any shaky-voiced, anxious versions of "What are we going to do?" As grade-school kids, they each owned more flashlights and headlamps than the typical American household can probably amass together, and our house was unlikely to grow cold. Still, I needed to give them something to do. It became tradition that I wipe the dust and ash off the top of the woodstove and we slap a few slices of bread directly onto the hot black iron. "Uh oh, the power's out! Time to make toast!"

In a way it may have been a metaphor for "Time to enjoy simpler things." It was definitely a message intended to convey that "We are not in trouble." It was also a bit of a distraction, as their dad had to go into overdrive as anybody with a working telephone started calling us.

When the storms would come, and the wind blew hard — as it does here, you can be sure — and the trees swayed and snapped, and shallow-rooted "maritime spruce" growing precariously among the ledges toppled, and branches came down and took power lines with them, it would be time to get busy. My kids' dad was, and still is, occasionally a lineman, and along with a small cluster of chainsaw-wielding helpers it is his role to get rigged up and go out into the weather.

It was my intention to raise children who would not hesitate to be among those chainsaw-wielding helpers whenever, and wherever, their turn would come. Even if they grew up to reside in places where the power company could never allow or accept the help of the neighborhood — which means most of civilization — they would know that there was likely something they could do. They would know what it feels like to respond to the call and to be out there in the rain.

I like to take the opportunity each winter, in my various columns and essays, as appropriate, to offer a thumbs-up and a smile to utility crews, just a simple "thank you." As a rule, some curmudgeon out there — perhaps justifiably grumpy, cold and annoyed — has something impatient to add about how those guys are paid and thus doing nothing above and beyond. That is certainly true, but so are firefighters and many others who come when we're in trouble. Let me suggest that anybody working long hours in the bad weather deserves a thank you, paid or not, so enough of that. This isn't about a goofy hero worship; it's about respect for hard work. Thank you, be ye knuckle-dragging Neanderthal linemen or lobstermen with chainsaws. Yeah, we know a few of these guys.

We could stand to remember that our technology-heavy culture is not just about electronics, but about the people who keep the lights burning. It still takes people; printed circuit boards don't work on their own. Cell phones and handheld Internet devices and apps and video games and the manifold machines of computer-controlled commerce don't work by themselves. We are dependent on electricity.

But maybe, for a few days at a time, we aren't. After each blackout, nor'easter or other utility lapse we hear a few tales of warmth and comfort, of people reuniting with their kids over board games and woodstove cooking. There are suppers by candlelight and early bedtimes with flashlights and comic books, here and there some home-made music, a lot less housecleaning, a lot more quiet. There are stories of neighbors sharing limited resources with neighbors, resources like refrigeration, or running water, or a place to charge the cell phones. There are occasional admissions of gratitude for things usually taken for granted and left unnoticed.

Obviously, each community of any size sees a few awful experiences too, with carbon monoxide poisoning one of the worst among the common problems, and enough burst pipes, freezers filled with ruined food, trees through roofs and road accidents to stop us romanticizing any ice storm. I am not belittling anybody's crises. Thankfully, trouble serious enough to be newsworthy is usually rare, and the majority of us among the temporarily unwashed masses are merely inconvenienced. Well, alright — something more than that, something in the middle, beyond irritated but not really endangered.

If the phone lines are unharmed, and often they are, many people still cannot make a call because the only telephones they own are electricity-dependent cordless sets. There's nothing like an old-fashioned, hard-wired telephone when you have to call for help. If the outage goes long, having an alternative source of heat is an enormous pleasure. I think it a real shame that it is so hard to buy a completely non-electric gas stove these days. With such a rig one can get a little warmth into the kitchen and presumably keep the pipes from freezing, not to mention make the coffee in complete safety with the stovetop percolator, so long as the propane holds out.

A few around these parts take pride in their — uh, our self-sufficiency. We aren't quite up there with the survivalist worriers who develop their skills out of fear, but we don't mind a little physical effort, concessions to the weather or low-tech communications. I remember watching "1900 House;" do you recall public television's early entry into reality TV, with a family of hapless suburbanites totally devoid of hobbies trying to make do with the available technologies of a century past? I laughed and hooted, along with friends Robin and Suzanne, because between the three of us we'd successfully navigated every bit of this supposedly difficult "old-fashionedness" painlessly and joyfully and largely for fun. By way of a disclaimer, I love electricity. I think household electrification may have been the biggest human game-changer since the invention of the wheel. I know a little bit about electricity (not a lot, mind you, but something.) This is no small thing we're talking about. But still...

I have lugged my water — not once, but for a couple of years, when I lived in a house in South Thomaston that was basically a camp. I have also lived where my refrigerator was an icebox, not for a day, but for months. Our refrigerator died at a time when there was no money for a new one, in a place where nobody knew how to locate a secondhand appliance. We had access to a deep freeze, so every other day a half-dozen gallon jugs of ice would be swapped out for the other jugs, by now melted, which would be returned to the freezer. Notes everywhere around the house read, "Remember to change the ice." Forget, and the milk goes sour. In retrospect, big deal; lots of people go camping. So what?

Are we resourceful, resilient Mainers? Do we get to indulge in a little rah-rah cheerleading about being ready for the bad weather because this is Maine? Are people less able in other places? I assume not, because I once lived in a major city and felt myself pretty damned resilient, but I have also heard all the usual stereotypes about how "city people" cannot handle adversity because they don't own four-wheel drives. That's baloney, of course, but as long as we're counting our power-outage blessings let's be glad for all the woodpiles, generators, deep freezes and deer-camp cooks among us. We could have it a hell of a lot worse than to be in the dark among Mainers.

There will be more storms, and ice, and power outages; our planet can be a rough neighborhood. Each one hits the newspapers like it's a one-off event, but of course we know better. Next time, people will be annoyed or cold or late for work and a few — hopefully fewer each time — will be in real trouble one way or another. Next time, if we are so fortunate as to be safe, let's play that guitar, perk some coffee, enjoy the electronic quiet (as the wind thumps loudly,) make some woodstove toast with the little kids — and remember to change the ice.

Eva Murray lives on Matinicus.