Monday
Morning finally dawns. I look out the window and practically every tree on our street looks like it has been carelessly pruned. The branches ripped off of the trees and littering the yards and streets. Some houses have branches sitting on or leaning against their roof. At least one house has a huge limb sticking out of the roof. The rest of the branches buried in one of the rooms of the house itself.
Power is out all over the state from tree limbs taking out the power lines and poles. The radio says we made national news and over 100,000 units are without power. With the numbers continuing to rise. I am thankful that we still have power, our home is undamaged, and we’re warm.
I call our local friends and family and check on them and let them know how we’re doing. Some have power and others don’t. All are safe and doing fine. I write up an email to the rest of our family (Most of our family is several hours behind us.) letting them know we made it through the storm safe and sound and at least we still had power. Just as I’m about to hit send the power goes out.
With no central heating the house quickly starts to cool. We use the dry firewood from the patio to get a fire going and keep at least part of the house warm. We get the rest of the rick of wood from the backyard (There is about a 1/2″ thick layer of ice over the top of the wood and the wood is soaked from the icy rain.) to under the patio so it can dry off and be readily available.
The numbers by now are in the mid to high 200,000 range for those without power. Generators are coming in and going out just as fast. We spend the night in the family room around the fireplace. Alternating sleeping and keeping the fire going in the fireplace.