Did you ever play that thought game as a kid where you said what superpower you would have, if you could choose? What did you pick? I always picked time travel. Paradoxes be damned, I’ve always wanted to travel to different whens just as much or even more than I dream of traveling to different wheres.
Well, this week I am writing to you on my phone in my dark home. Pittsburgh experienced a worse storm on Tuesday than we have in decades. A storm that has set our personal household back about a hundred years to a time when we might have had running water and a cook stove but no electricity.
I’m still figuring out what I’m learning from this, but so far I’ve got 3 lessons.
First, I’m more grateful every hour for my community. For the cafe owner not too far away (who was my first boss art a day camp in 1989) who welcomed us for breakfast yesterday and told us to bring all our chargers and eat next to the outlets. For my sister in law and her open door, open electricity policy. For fridge and freezer space (my groceries are all over the 412 area code).
Second, my boys and I can’t stop observing how lucky we are that the row of row houses we live in went undamaged when just a few homes in either direction did not fare so well. That it’s not too cold or too hot to live without hvac. That we like candle light and still have water. That the cell tower came back online for us within 24 hours. That we like each other and so the lots of extra togetherness is mostly a good thing.
And last, despite my love for the unexpected, my appreciation for disruptions, I’m shocked by how thrown I am by this fundamental shift in what’s possible. It’s a new kind of uncomfortable for me, one I personally did not feel during the pandemic lockdown.
The power company says we (all 155,000 homes still without power) should be back up by this time next week. So I’ll see what else I learn and where this takes me. If you have any thoughts, I’m interested!
All my best,
Dr. G
