Day 65

Longtime readers of this blog, if any, know that if there's one thing I love complaining about, it's falling trees and power outages.  So yesterday's tree fall and blackout might be just the thing to snap me out of my what's-the-point-of-it-all? quandary and get me posting here again.

I've learned by now that it's usually a bad idea for me to start up a video game late at night, but last Friday, after watching Bill Maher and Room 104 on HBO (btw, is anyone else noticing the creative ingenuity behind the latter?), I didn't feel quite like going to bed yet, so I started playing my latest obsession, Ark (more on that in a later post).  It was 11:30 p.m. when I started.  Then next time I looked at the time, it was 3:00 a.m. 

I brushed my teeth and went to bed, but for one reason or another (this is not atypical for me), I woke up and rolled over to go back to sleep.  But as I checked the time to see how long I had been out, I noticed that the alarm clock was black.

No power.  Again.  I wondered where the tree had fallen this time.

I got up and looked at my cell phone.  It was 5:00 a.m. I had been asleep for two hours.  Checking the Georgia Power outage map, I didn't see any indication they were aware of my situation.  

The logical thing, since there was nothing else to be done anyway, would have been to go back to sleep and deal with anything that needed to be dealt with if the power wasn't back on in the morning. But laying there in bed, my mind didn't accept that logic and wondered about which tree had fallen and where, and how big of a deal it will be to repair the lines. I put on some pants and my shoes, grabbed my handy flashlight, and went outside to investigate.

Just as I did, I saw a Georgia Power utility truck, bright flood- and searchlights on high and looking for all the world like a UFO from Close Encounters, coming down the road.  It stopped at each telephone pole and scanned the lines with its bright searchlights, and then finally stopped three houses down the road from me. I started to approach to see the problem for myself, but ironically the blindingly bright lights in my eyes kept me from seeing what they were doing.  I figured I'll just go check it out in the morning and went back home to go back to sleep, secure in the knowledge that the problem was being addressed.

Before I got back beneath the sheets, the power came back on.  It was 5:30 a.m.  If I hadn't rolled over when I did, I wouldn't have been aware of the outage, and would have have just awoken later in the morning to a blinking alarm clock

Later in the morning, when the sun had finally risen and I had my morning coffee, I went to check out the damage.  An entire tree hadn't fallen, just one very large branch which was still laying near the middle  of the road.  Interestingly, it was almost the exact same spot where a major tree had fallen just before Christmas, knocking out power for a day and internet and cable for about three (including the Christmas holiday).

Many years ago, what we call "Georgia" was once a vast forest occupied by Creeks, who lived harmoniously with the land.  But Caucasian Europeans came across the waters and drove out the Creeks.  They axed the trees and built all manners of houses, shopping malls, factories and other monstrosities, and planted only the occasional decorative tree to replace their clear cuts.  But those trees grew, and after enough years they grew taller than most of the houses, shopping malls, factories, and other monstrosities.  Now, they've collapsing back down, demolishing all that offensive infrastructure and reclaiming the continent for Mother Nature and for the Creeks.  

You could say they're making America great again.