“Look on the bright side,” Mom used to say when things seemed
particularly bleak. Sometimes that positive ray can be hard to find.
Sunday at 6:30 p.m., electricity vanished at more than 300,000
homes, including ours, in southwestern Michigan . A huge storm with 70 m.p.h. winds was the cause. The power company estimated service restoration in five or six days. The weather forecast said low temperatures likely would be below freezing the next night.
 |
| --Kalamazoo Gazette Photo |
We started our gas log fireplace, but without an electric
fan to circulate the warmed air it wasn't a big help. Our son performed a
partial rescue with a small portable generator. He hooked it up to our
refrigerator and freezer to save several hundred dollars worth of food.
Monday was unpleasant at our place. No computing. No reading
early in the morning or when evening darkness fell. No television. No hot
meals. Barely adequate warmth. It is amazing how much we've come to depend upon
electricity.
Then I remembered Mom’s advice and thought about a bright
side. One appeared. The power went out half way through the Packers’ televised
football game. The few players not on the injured list were being crushed by yet
another mediocre team. True Packers fans never leave a game until the bitter
end. I was saved from another hour or two of intense suffering when the power
went off.
Almost as positive as the early end of the Green Bay game for me was the cautious restoration estimate by our electric
company. Our power came on one day after it went out, not five or six. However, several
thousand others remain without electricity today. Probably only a few are
hoping to stay in the dark until Sunday night so they can miss another Packers
defeat. Most people around here are Lions fans.
