The Angels are moving furniture this evening, Saturday 25 July 2009

My Grandma used to tell me that when there was thunder, it was just the Angels in heaven moving furniture. I don't remember if the thunder scared me, or if she just told me that as a way to assure me that everything was all right as she tucked me in to sleep.

I remember that I was also told that the sound of thunder was from Angels bowling in heaven.

Some times the flashes of lightening, and the profound sound of the thunder that followed, and the downpour of rain, and all of them together, frightened me when I was a child. I'm not sure why I was frightened, yet I remember being tense when the lightening, thunder, rain, wind, happened all at once and continued for what I thought were long periods of time.

Nowadays, I love to watch the clouds tumble through the sky and to watch thunderheads grow. I like to watch the storm fronts advance through the sky, I follow the paths of the storms through the area, and when we're elsewhere, sometimes I'll be able to watch the movement of storms, and rain, or snow, in the distance across the mountains, or the plains, or as the storms move out to sea.

Where we live, we get a lot of "weather"; the "weather" often causes the power to go out, often for hours at a time.

Over the years, I've learned to anticipate the effects of stormy weather--I have candles, battery lanterns, a propane Coleman stove, a crankable radio, and more recently, a supply of bottled water.

When the power goes out, it's a nice break in the routine of life in a world where everything seems to depend on electricity. Sure, if it's sticky hot and humid outside, and there's no air-conditioning, everyone gets super hot, and wishes for a breeze. Even so, things are quiet. when it gets dark, there's very little light, except for the glow of candles, or lanterns in our home, and the homes of our neighbors. There's no whine of heat-pumps or generators, or other sounds of the electric age we live in.

Traffic slows down too--without traffic lights, people stay home. Traffic without traffic lights is chaotic, dangerous.

So, when we're at home, we slow down too--it's amazing to consider how dependent we are on the technology of our times--without electricity, almost everything comes to a stop. So, what do we do?

The last time the power was out for a long time--it may have been ten hours or so, my daughter and I were home alone, and we brought out the crankable radio, and found the local NPR station, and along with a little news about the power outages, we listened to classical music, that she explained to me, and we read, played board games, and spent time with each other.

All of the things that we might have been doing, that required the use of electric power to accomplish, were put aside--they were no longer important, and we didn't really miss the electricity.

Now, I won't try to say that I'd prefer to go without electricity for extended periods of time, yet, these small interludes in which we do without the power, aren't times that we fear--we do look forward to those times, and we make good use of the time as these opportunities arise.

The lesson? we should communicate more with our family members, and enjoy our time together while eliminating external distractions.

That's not all, just all that I have time for today. I was kind of hoping that we'd lose power for a while--losing power imposes the constraints upon me that I seem to enjoy--meaning, the slowing down, the quiet time with my husband and children, the focus on family, and the loss of many of the distractions that I encourage through the various uses of the technology that surrounds me.

I'm responsible for my captivity in the technology I live with. Likewise I am responsible to taking myself away from it too--I suppose that taking myself away from is easier said than done--I think that it's like an addiction--an addiction to the technology, and the benefits it brings along with everything else.

Lila