And The Lights Went Out.....

I came across this sketch by an artist by the name of "Sloan" and thought it to be appropriate (I guess in a romantic sort of way) for this past week. As Hurricane Ike hit Galveston and devestated that poor city, it continued on up through the country, all the way to my little town of Darlington, Pennsylvania. On that night, as we were watching the "Pittsburgh Steelers", the lights went out in Darlington.

The winds went on to "Howl" that night for about 4 hours. My dog, lady, who loves to be outside, would not step foot into the yard. I tried many times to get her to go out "to make herself more comfortable, so to speak", but she ran right back into the house. Do I blame her? Not one bit. For you see, those wind gusts hit 81 mph! Never in my life have I experienced such a frightening storm. A storm without one drop of rain! Just the constant sweep of wind.

In our area, we have many hills to break up the wind. In addition, we live down in a little valley and really did not get the full impact of the wind. But, living in the country, as we do, we got our share of downed limbs and sticks and green leaves that just blew right off the trees. We lost one tree. I thank the good Lord he chose to keep those tall oaks standing around our house. It truly is amazing how they bend and sway in the wind.

Needless to say, out came the candles and the oil lamps, and of course, thank goodness we had good batteries in the flashlights.

Since we had no electric and we have a well, we had no pump to pump the water. Thank goodness for the places that did have electric and gave us free water. My sweet hubby made many trips, with many containers to haul water. I have to tell you ladies that I have a "new appreciation" for the frontier women who toted and fetched water all day long. Water to drink, water to bathe, water to flush toilets, water for the dog. I can see why those women were in way better shape than I am!

God bless my mother for having a generator for us to use so we didn't lose everything in our freezer. Those peaches that were picked and frozen to enjoy in the middle of winter, would surely have been missed!

But here we are, a week later, and the lights came back on at 6PM last night, right when the Steeler game was on! It's like I dreamed all this......

have a wonderful week,
Kitty