Powerless Wayland, Post-Irene

At first, it was exciting – almost like living in the colonial period. I felt a strong connection with my Pilgrim ancestors. (Although, now that I think about it, I didn’t have any Pilgrim ancestors. I’m pretty sure my great-great-grandparents were Irish immigrants. So let me rephrase: I felt a kinship with my Pilgrim brothers and sisters, in the spiritual sense.)

All too quickly, however, I remembered that the colonial lifestyle was very different from ours today – mainly, they were accustomed to life without electricity, so they established practices that were not dependent on it. I have some specific examples (and uneducated exaggerations, I’m sure) in mind.

1. They didn’t shower. Yes, they went swimming in the summer and splashed water on their faces in the winter, but it was in no way feasible to scrub your whole body clean when you woke up with the sun and it was freezing cold. The great thing about the colonial period was that no one showered! The guy next to you couldn't pinpoint the smelly person when he was so comfortable with his own bodily stench! Unfortunately, that is not the case today and when I’m the only person in my office currently living in the Dark Ages, it’s not really acceptable for me to show up both greasy and with wrinkled clothing. But the unheated water in my house is so cold.

2. They didn’t stockpile hundreds of dollars worth of food in the refrigerator. Colonists ate fresh food, fresh. Maybe we should learn something from that … then we wouldn’t be spending money on ice and extra coolers in an attempt to save the meat, frozen veggies and TV dinners that formerly clogged the freezer space. (We obviously ate the ice cream as soon as the power went out.)

3. They didn’t depend on traffic lights to enable their morning commute. They had to use stop signs at major intersections all the time! Such a pain.

4. They didn't miss the VMAs on Sunday night! Just kidding. Even if I'd had power, I probably wouldn’t have watched the VMAs. I would have been watching the new ABC Family original series Switched at Birth on Netflix. Just kidding. (Actually I’m not kidding, but I felt the need to say I was. It’s always embarrassing to admit you’re addicted to the oh-so-corny ABC Family originals. Even though I’m pretty sure that Switched at Birth is groundbreaking television in its portrayal of deaf culture to the uneducated hearing public.) Either way, I felt the need to address our addiction to television in my list of why the power outage is difficult for us Waylandites.

Thus, my life is hard. (#FirstWorldProblems, for all you twitter fans out there.) Although it still is kind of fun once I stop dreading my morning ice bath. The stars are much brighter now that the whole town is dark, and driving through Wayland at night without streetlights does feel like I’m closer to nature. Curling up in my bed at 9 p.m. with my worn out copy of Ender’s Game and my headlamp brings me back to the days where I had to sneak reading hours under my covers after lights out. And sitting on the front porch with my parents and a bottle of wine on Sunday evening watching huge family groups walk past our house in an effort to escape the confines of their dark homes did make me feel like part of a tight-knit community.

Maybe Hurricane Irene got some things right after all.