His perspective:

We don’t get much rain in Arizona (duh!), but when it does finally rain, we get really good rain. That was Monday evening.

We were at Target buying soccer equipment and pickles when our first real monsoon storm rolled in. I was just about to slide my Visa into the card reader when the lights went off throughout the store. The clerk rolled his eyes and calmly let us know that the backup power would get the POS system back online in a few moments. Fortunately for us, he was right. In the meantime there was an eerie darkness throughout the store and a few cries from kids who weren’t sure about the darkness and alarms.

Driving back home we experienced a storm that I can only compare to a tropical storm. I’ll check with Rob later and see what it’s really like. When we arrived home, the power was out. It was immediately obvious as my garage door refused to open no matter how many times I clicked the clicker. We went through the front door.

In my childhood, when the power went out, I could count on the fact that as soon as we actually located the candles and the matches during a power outage, the power would immediately come back on. It’s a little known law of Murphy that as soon as you’re prepared for the outage, it will be over. So, with that in mind, I took my time locating what I could to help light the house. My wife eventually found everything. Surprisingly the power refused to return even after lighting the candles. I mentioned that to my wife as we sat down to tuna fish sandwiches and fruit cups.

Two hours later (give or take) everything came back on. In the meantime I had to answer questions from my daughter about what it was like in the olden times when I grew up and didn’t have video games, DVDs and computers – even when there was power. I wouldn’t last much longer than a day without power now. For my kids it would be less than that.

Her perspective (true to form with women needing to have the last word):

We live in amazing times.  It seems every convenience, with exception to the transporter and food replicator, are available to us.  However, about 99% of these conveniences are contingent upon electricity.  I can’t imagine life without electricity.  But fate was determined to force a quick look last night when our power went out due to an amazing monsoon storm.  At first my husband felt no need to do anything as in his experience as soon as you found the candles the power came back on.  I was a little less optimistic knowing we have only been in our home for three months and there are still a lot of things that I don’t know the location of.  I knew I hadn’t bought new matches since our move and didn’t know where a single flashlight was.  He was less concerned calling to my memory that I had purchased some lighters for the grill our first week and knew there was a flashlight in the tool kit in the garage.  Great ideas the both of them, except I didn’t know where those lighters got put and you couldn’t see anything in the garage without a flashlight.

Thank heaven for little girls with good memories and trust a female to save the day.  My daughter knew exactly where the toy flashlight was.  It was right exactly where she said it was, on the dresser in my closet.  Wow.  I’d give anything for a fraction of her memory.  It worked just well enough to see something in the garage.  I knew we had one my folks gave me for Christmas a few years ago and it was a big one.  Instead I found the tiny AA battery one which was dead, but I knew where new batteries were.  Incidentally, this flashlight was the one that saved the day as the one in the tool kit that my husband was banking on had a charge that lasted about 2 minutes – and that was with both batteries, and I never located the big one - proof that bigger isn’t always better.  So the flashlight security was a bust, but the reminder that I’d bought lighters proved helpful.  I had such pride as I lit the candle votive in the upstairs hallway remembering the day I hung it with the painting telling myself what a great place that would be for a candle if we ever needed one.  That’s one for me.  Dealing with the loud fire alarms was one for him so I guess we’re even.

Climbing in our bed with our kids by candle light and watching the lightening was a fun time, but I’m glad we don’t have to do it every night.  I’m especially glad that I can wake up to a hot shower, not to mention bacon that cooks in the microwave in just a few minutes.  Thank you Benjamin Franklin! 

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