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January 03, 2006
Never Put Off Til Tomorrow . . .
Posted at January 3, 2006 11:13 AM in Lifestyle .
Every year I take off a few days after New Year’s for planning and reflection. Unfortunately, since all of my sick time went toward my hospital stay, I had no choice but to use most of my vacation time for doctor’s visits and sick days off. This did not leave me much in the way of vacation time for planning a decent vacation. In order to create this tiny, little, mini vacation for myself I had to do some creative planning.
This time of the year can be quite brutal. In Chicago, the first of the year would typically have me dealing either with extreme cold or a heavy snow. Either one would keep me shut up in the house. Here in Los Angeles, January can be equally brutal with incessant heavy rains. Well, this is precisely what I had to deal with during this mini vacation—heavy rains. I also had a little something extra thrown in to create an extra special spicy experience.
As I am wont to do when I have a little time off, I loosely plan my days and at times will throw caution to the wind through an act, or acts, of procrastination. What I mean by this is I will plan to do something on a certain day and, if I don’t feel up to it that day, will put it off til tomorrow. A foolish luxury certainly, but one I’ve come to enjoy every now and then, particularly when I know I have time. Well, was I in for a huge surprise?
I had plans of doing a marathon run at FemmeNoir. My intention was to put the full site up with all of the Leaders/Legends, articles, photos, etc. However, on Sunday I didn’t feel up to it. Actually, I was a little late at doing something else—my discharge and fast. I did not start my fast until Saturday and decided to do the discharge on Saturday as well. The discharge is when I stay up until I find myself getting sleepy. Surprisingly—and it is probably because I spent a good deal of time talking with a friend—I ended up staying awake for a full 24-hours—26.5 hours to be precise.
Additionally, I ended up losing a very big seven pounds. I’ve never lost seven pounds while doing a fluid fast—never—two pounds, perhaps four or five, but never seven. I can only assume this is due in large part to the prednisone I was taking. I also noticed I stopped leaking protein during this time as well. I don’t know what that means but it is what it is.
Needless to say, I kind of reveled in the fact I lost so much weight, toyed with the idea of taking my braids down and perhaps trying my hand – or hair – at that new afro type style kinda kinky look only to later realize my hair won’t go along with anything like that. Basically, I goofed off on Sunday thinking I could put off til tomorrow—Monday—what I had planned to do on Sunday. Yes, quite a foolish thought.
On Monday, I glanced at my clock, barely awake, and saw it was 9:30. I thought I would take a little snooze and get up, make coffee, and get to work. Later, when I glanced at my clock again I was met with a black face. There was nothing there. No little green numbers flashing back at me, nothing, absolutely nothing.
I turned to my television, pushed the remote to turn it on and nothing. “Wait,” I thought to myself. While still lying in bed I listened for familiar sounds and no, the sound of energy flowing through the house, that little hum we typically hear but have come to ignore, take for granted, assume will always be there—there was nothing. The house was silent.
I keep a small light on in the bathroom and I rose to look in that direction only to see darkness. The same was true for the little light I keep on in the living room, my office, the kitchen—darkness.
I rose and went into the living room, opened the blinds and saw my large deodar was still standing, swaying in the wind, limbs heavy with water, and the rain was coming down, pouring, relentlessly.
Both of my dogs knew very well what was happening outside and both were feigning sleep. It was clear they were willing to do anything but go outside. I made it clear I too would do anything to keep them from messing inside the house. I moved each one up, into the kitchen and out the back door, into the rain, and as if they could hear or comprehend English, told them to “make it quick.” They did but I knew it had nothing to do with my instruction to them; they were very interested in making it quick.
Electricity is a necessity. I thought many times about solar energy, or putting solar panels atop this house, but it never occurred to me how much I take this wonderful power source for granted. I COULD NOT MAKE COFFEE!
I stood there looking at Mr. Coffee wondering how I could get him to operate without electricity. I had gotten rid of my little Melita which would have only required me turning on the stove, heating water, and then after pouring the water though the coffee grinds, would have had a nice, fresh pot of coffee. What was I thinking?
Ah, desperate measures, desperate times. I had to go out for coffee.
I returned with my coffee and croissant only to discover THERE WAS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING I COULD DO! Nothing. No computer, no television, no lights, it was dark and overcast because of the rain, no music, nothing. Everything required power and the more I realized that, the more depressing it became.
I knew I could have plugged my cell phone to my laptop to check emails and fortunately, I purchased an external battery (five hours) for my laptop. I also knew I would need my cell phone and did not want to wear down the battery just for checking emails or surfing the net. It certainly would have cut down on boredom, but only for so long.
I have two portable phones, one desktop phone, and if I count my fax machine, a fourth phone. Unfortunately, all require electricity to work, meaning, I could not use them. Bored, I picked up my cell phone anyway and started making phone calls to the electric company, my mother, a few friends, and my brother. After a few hours of conversation, the cell’s battery started wearing down. “No more phone calls Angela, you may need this later.”
Finally, it occurred to me. While thinking like a girl scout some years ago, I purchased one of those Princess phones—the kind of phone that requires no electricity to operate—and I purchased a 100 foot cord for the phone. Eureka! But, what exactly did I do with this little phone was my question.
With flashlight in hand, I walked through the house checking every little cubby hole until I finally found the phone, in a drawer, just where it should have been, my emergency drawer. I had forgotten it was red and that I had called it my hotline for times such as these. Fabulous! At the same time, my cell was ringing and it was my mother. I knew I would not be able to answer the cell because the battery was low and, since I live in the boonies, low cell power meant not enough cell power to compensate for the boonies.
Quickly, I straightened out the entangled cord for the hotline, plugged it into the wall and voila, a dial tone. Immediately, I also heard I had a message which had to be my mother. I called her back.
I later went out to the car to charge my cell phone. I made sure I turned off the cell service so the phone could charge in peace. Back in the house I thought up ways to make this a more pleasant experience and all the while I kicked myself for putting off for today what I should have done yesterday. Monday would have been a great day for reveling in my weight loss and playing with my hair.
Since I live in the boonies, I am constantly buying batteries. Raccoons, skunks, O-Possums, and the like are notorious for walking across transformers and blowing their brains out, along with the power in this community. As such, I have about a hundred flashlights and 5,000 batteries—okay, that’s an overstatement—but I am well prepared for times such as these. Fortunately, they have never lasted long but the little power outage I was experiencing had been going on for well over four hours already.
Since I had plugged in the little Princess—my hotline—I was finally able to get through to SCE. The wait was approximately 35 minutes, minutes I could not afford using on my cell. This is when I heard the bad news. The power outage affected over 1,000 customers, they didn’t know where it was, they didn’t know how to fix it, and they could not give an estimated time for repair. Darn, darn, darn!
I love my gadgets, I absolutely love them but I could not use a single one—well, sans the iPod and its incredible battery life. Yes, and thankfully I had just downloaded a few monologues from Audible to the iPod, along with a few interviews and of course several Rocketboom feeds. Yep, about eight hours of entertainment and the iPod handled it beautifully without losing its cool.
Alright, cell phone was charged—somewhat—fresh batteries were in the arsenal of flashlights, all I needed now were a few scented candles for ambiance, perhaps a better battery-operated TV or radio for entertainment just in case, and of course dinner. I could use my stove because I know how to get around the electronic ignition, but I could not see that well in the kitchen to make dinner and I wanted to keep the fridge closed.
I’ve been planning to purchase a new fridge because it has become a dysfunctional fridge from hell. There is an ice build-up in both the fridge and freezer but, on this day, I felt it best to let the dysfunctional fridge from hell and its ice build up work for me. There was no way I was opening that thing.
It would figure Target had run out of that nice little crank radio, TV, spotlight thingy I so wanted. Again, procrastination bit me in the butt. I should have purchased it when I first saw it but, alas, c’est la vie. I did get the scented candles and a couple of flashlights and resolved to make that old radio, TV tuner, flashlight thing I have work—and I did, sort of.
As night fell, I realized we were having a very strange power outage. One block here was out, another over there was not, and on my street, with all of the houses without power, there were these two houses in a cul-de-sac, in the middle of the block, with power—only two—and that was a little peculiar. I watched as one house, with Christmas lights all around including the bushes, went completely out leaving only the bushes lit. WTF! I am sure it was equally surprising to the owner who found himself with lights, and then no lights. I guess something in the power grid could not sustain all of those Christmas lights.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I placed batteries in the little dome lights my mother has been raving about. I bought a couple of small ones and some large ones. These worked beautifully. I placed them all over the house. My flat-bottom flashlights were placed everywhere as well. I lit a couple of jasmine candles, fixed that crazy radio and tuned it to some slow jams—old school—got my dinner ready and was set.
Just as I was settling in to my lighting artistry, the power came on. Darn the bad luck as I was really getting into it. Oh well, off went the little dome lights, the candles, the flashlights, etc. In my office, everything had to be reset and I did that and listened to the beautiful sounds of equipment powering up. The televisions and DirecTV box needed resetting and I did that. Weird thing was I had to retune one of my televisions—don’t know why I needed to do that.
I have one dog suffering with cataracts and thankfully, I could let him out now feeling comfortable he would not run himself into anything outside. He can see shadows or objects if there is some light available to him. He does not like being in the dark—he’s noisy when he’s in the dark—he cries a lot, a very high-pitched, awful, cry. I have to keep a lot of light around him otherwise I cannot move without him being under foot, constantly, almost tripping me.
I called my mother, assured her all was well, the lights were back on and I was ready to turn the computer on and pick up the hundreds of emails I knew were waiting for me. I plugged in my cell, checked around the house to ensure all was well and then, BANG, the lights went out again, then back on again, off again, then back on and finally off again.
Great! I went back through the house turning on those little dome lights. Picked up the flash lights and started placing them around. I turned on the radio, grabbed the hotline and went into my office. I was thankful I did not turn my computer on because of all of that off and on business. So, I picked up the iPod, listened to a few interviews, and was preparing myself for bed when the phone rang.
My friend Caroline had just gotten in from what she called a dysfunctional dinner with family—the hostess, her cousin, is homophobic, suspects her cousin to be a lesbian, makes cracks about her not marrying, and my friend believes “she’s a closeted homosexual and you can quote me on that.” Actually, from the sound of it, I think my friend’s cousin secretly resents Caroline’s freedom. But then, that’s me.
My friend arrived home only to discover she too was in the dark. She only had a – and I mean one – flashlight and her cell phone. That was it. Her poor pooch had been wandering in the dark all day and was freaking out. “I have just come from my annual worse dinner of the year” she said “all I wanted to do was come home and chill!” She was a little stressed to say the least.
I told her about the on again, off again, experience we had earlier and suggested she wait a little while. “I believe they found the problem but it will probably take a while for them to repair it, if they can repair it tonight.” Not the best thing I could have said. Basically, she lost it.
I spent the better part of an hour trying to calm her down hoping all the while the lights would soon come on for her benefit. As she reached the high point of her discourse, the part where she was going to tell her cousin “yeah, I’m a damn dyke and what of it” – she didn’t say that of course – one of my dome lights went out.
The passion in her conversation should have been enough to turn the lights in the whole city on blast. Needless to say, it did not, though it should have. In the meantime, my domes were one by one shutting down and I had to get off the phone and replace the batteries, she needed to calm down and sleep it off, and I needed to retire as well.
We ended our conversation with her screaming, one more time, about her “f’d up day” and promised to be more civil in the morning. Me, all I could do was look at the blank stare of my computer while thinking I really should never put off anything for tomorrow.
I walked through the house turning off my domes, moving lights, blew out the candles, peered through the blinds to gaze upon the dark, very dark street outside, thought about my fruitless day, and went to bed. Two hours later, everything came on at full blast, the television in my bedroom, a light, and the stereo I had inadvertently turned on and forgot to turn off when the lights came on previously.
Angrily, I jumped up and turned everything off and returned to bed. As I lay there, only then did I realize the beauty of the day was in the silence. The silence was absolutely beautiful. No television, the absence of sound from current running through the house, no fans or air purifiers—and yeah, I didn’t sneeze all day—it was all very inspiring and absolutely beautiful. The dim lights, the candlelight, the smell of jasmine I made available only because there were no lights, all very wonderful.
I then thought I should have had a bath, in the darkness, and I should have filled the dark spaces with scents. It was actually a great day. No emails, no responses, no need to do anything really but relax and so it was, I thought, absolutely necessary to have such a day to enjoy silence.
All I heard all day was the sound of falling rain and the whisper of trees and when I wanted distraction, I paid close attention to the artistry of the spoken word and old school love songs. I would never have done this for myself under normal circumstances. Yeah, it truly was a great day and I fell peacefully asleep to silence, because I chose it to be so. It wasn’t so bad afterall.