Power less

Yesterday, we lost power for 3 1/2 hours. I didn't catch on to the power going out right away. Jen was playing her computer game while I was going around the house, tidying up and getting the morning routine "started." She stopped me on my way past the computer and said that the computer went off in the middle of her game. Confused, I looked over the computer, then I woke up hubby to tell him about it. He nodded, said to let the computer stay off for 10 minutes, then start it up again. (It's a new computer so I don't know why this news didn't surprise him.) But before I left the room, he alerted me to the fact that the alarm clock was off, too. He told me to check next door to see if they were without power. But first I checked the other rooms to verify that the lights weren't working. Then I went next door, on both sides, and sure enough, my neighbors were without power, too. I asked one neighbor if he was going to call to find out what happened and, when he said yes, I asked him to let me know. (We can't make phone calls ourselves to find out.)

When I came back, hubby was up and checking around to make sure the power outage wasn't going to hurt anything. Then he took a candle into the bathroom for light while he showered.

Jen had a hard time understanding what the power outage meant. She wanted to watch a Rolie Polie Olie movie she checked out from the library but I told her the TV and DVD player won't work when the power is out. So we went over the things she COULDN'T do while the power was out: She couldn't play her computer game, watch any movies or listen to music. And she said, "And you can't check your email." (Well, I was okay with that, since I'd already checked it earlier that morning.) She wanted something to do so I suggested, "Well, why don't you do some art?" I reminded her how I'd cleaned up and organized her desk just the day before and how all of her paper and art stuff was right there for her to use. (Good thing I got her extra paper!) So she went into her room to create art at her desk.

Meanwhile, I wasn't stressing out over the power outage. It wasn't summer with HIGH HEAT to deal with (thank God!) and it's not like we had steaks in the freezer, or anything. (Actually...we pretty much just had a little bit of milk and two slices of turkey lunch meat in there to worry about. LOL Yeah, we had to do some grocery shopping.) But I DID get antsy over not being able to vacuum the carpet or do the laundry. I did what housework I could (except the dishes, since I'd assigned THAT job for after lunch/before dinner) but soon grew restless. Jennifer got restless, too, so soon I was suggesting other things that we could do together.

Like...put up the Halloween decorations! I'd bought the decorations WEEKS ago but we've all been so busy that we didn't get around to putting them up. So we all three put the decorations up. It was fun and Jennifer was really excited over it. I enjoyed it more because we did it together as a family.

Jennifer also wanted to do paper crafts. She created envelopes and wrote letters to her friends. She and her dad also played with a newspaper hat he made for her. And during all this, we munched on the leftover donuts and pizza that were in the fridge. (Well, we might as well eat them now!)

Finally, I worked with Jennifer on an activity book she had to do for school. Right around the time we finished, the power came back on! (How appropriate.) She ran around the house, turning on all the lights. Then she put on music and started playing her computer game again. Ah, yeah. She missed technology. LOL (I'd found out that the power had gone out because some guy had crashed into a power pole on a nearby street.)

Still, we had a great time even WITH the power out. And I'd noticed how neighbors were coming outside to clean up their yards or driveways and to just play together as a family. It made me think of maybe just how much we all miss as far as "together time" is concerned because of all the technological distractions in our lives. TV, radio, computers and video games.

So in a way, I'm glad the power went out. We needed that time together as a family. And, we should have some more of it happen, too -- not JUST when there's a power outage.