So on Friday night, we had some sort of rare type of storm. Around 8 pm or so we lost power. We decided we might as well go to the grocery store since we didn’t have electricity to power much of anything else. We went outside and above the house I could see this huge black thunderhead. By the time we found the car keys in the dark (I’d left them in my jeans and then washed them) the winds had picked up.
The storm caused winds up to 75 mph. But apparently the type of winds and their direction meant we didn’t get any more than a light smattering of rain. And I hear tale of multi-colored lightning that I unfortunately missed.
The next morning I drove to the barn and I saw the destruction everywhere. The roads were coated with leaves and little branches, while in many places larger branches and even trees were down. Many were alongside the road where they had been pulled out of the way of traffic. About halfway down Mt. Tabor, the road I use to get to the barn, a tree (or most of it anyway) had gone down taking a power line with it, and thus the road had to be closed. I had to detour back and around 460 to get to the barn.
The days have been up to 100 degrees, which is part of the reason the conditions for the storm were possible, but it’s also a very unfortunate time to not have power. We were able to charge our devices at the store and there looked up that 50% of our county has no power, that the destruction extends through West Virginia and up past DC into Maryland, and that some sort of damage has been done to the Appalachian Power stations themselves and they estimate it could take up to a week to get power back.
Yeah; not kidding. And I bought ice cream Friday night thinking the power couldn’t be off for that long.
While it is unfortunate that we don’t have power, or air conditioning at home (it’s currently 3am and I am sitting on my porch without pants on, typing this because it’s too hot to sleep) I am grateful that no one I know was hurt. That houses are intact. None of the horses were hurt out in the fields. That we have a place we can go to get power. That our car still has air conditioning. That I have things to entertain me that don’t involve being on the computer. And that because I got up in the middle of the night and went outside I was able to see a beautiful sight of lightning bugs sparkling in a dazzling display against the blackness of the trees behind our house.
