The Southwest Voice

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When power was finally restored two hours after our latest power outage, everything was blinking! Or clinking!

The clock on the microwave blasted “RESET” in gigantic, frantic letters! And the timer for the automatic sprinkler timer was obviously out of whack. Moving a little round sprinkler from place to place on the yard didn’t sound like such a bad idea. Windup alarm clocks seemed almost high tech! And I might even have welcomed a wood stove like my mother had in the early years of her marriage. All she had to do was bring the wood in and light a match! 

Even the old hand-held, hand crank, wall telephones sounded appealing –– the kind where when you picked up the handset you heard, “Operator, number please.” You can see what I mean if you rent old Jimmy Stewart movies.       

My telephone was flashing CL1!!!! The VCR was blinking wildly! (The DVD player is a jewel. It does its thing if there’s electricity and you pop a CD in!) The smoke alarm was plinking like a broken piano string. The automatic sprinkler timer was just plain dead! The clock radio was showing signs of serious hysteria, blinking "12:00/12:00/12:00" in bright red, Disney-type animation. I was just plain spooked.

Everywhere I looked something was either beeping or blinking or plinking. It was awful! I was beginning to think I was being followed in my own home by a patrol car! And I couldn’t escape if I wanted to! The garage door opener won’t work without electricity! 

It wasn’t easy but I finally found the instructions for the phone. Yikes! I am holding 60 pages of instructions and on top of that one side is upside down in Spanish and the other side is right side up in English. Or maybe the English side is upside down and the Spanish side is right side up –– never mind!

I looked under everything I could think of that would tell me what to do about a flashing CL1. Couldn’t find it. Finally started reading the book from the very beginning, carefully, methodically, with my index finger following every syllable! Found it!  ) Press “Select” until you hear day, hour and minute. 2) Press menu while you hold down select. WHAT??? That’s kind of like chewing gum and jumping rope at the same time! I failed that in grade school!  

The VCR instruction book was actually under the VCR! Punch buttons, look for displays, press enter, hit end, and on and on and on. Oh, who cares! Let it blink! Every house I walk into has a blinking VCR. 

The smoke alarm –– simple. Test it by standing underneath it and burning a piece of paper in a pie pan. BE CAREFUL!!!   

The sprinkler! Oh my goodness, the lawn was fertilized yesterday! The water HAS to come on at the right time, in the right places and two times a day! Where in the world is that book? Clean a closet. Clean a drawer.  Ahhaa! There it is in the desk drawer with last year’s Christmas cards.  OK, I set the sprinkler system. And while I was at it, I wrote notes to people I forgot to send Christmas cards to! I called the notes a “summer greeting.” 

It was providential that the power went out in the early morning because it took me all day to get everything working again. All I could think was, “It’s a good thing mom and dad are gone. They would not be able to deal with this.” I can’t help but wonder what my children will be doing 30 years from now and saying under their breath, “It’s a good thing mom’s gone.”