Around 8 am, Monday morning, while we are still trying to remove the remainder of sleep from our eyes, the power goes out. Just everything goes black. That’s it, no more…just silence. A very empty silence as the heaters wind down, the TV turned off, the air purifier dies. Nothing, no more, blank,…
We look at each other and know what we are thinking. We have been married for more than 30 yrs. Heck by now, our thoughts have to be approved by the other, before they can even be thought. What are we going to do with no electricity? Nothing works, not the heaters, not the heating blankets, not the water, as water pumps need electricity, and not the internet. That last one is big. It is really hard to find out what is going on without any outside communications. Not even the data on our phones worked, we soon discovered. Sure, we could call, we could text. But who are you going to call without knowing their number. You can’t call any motels, hotels, or inns. You don’t have their phone number. YOU HAVE NO INTERNET! People think you don’t need the internet but with these modern day cell phones you have no phone book.I am pretty certain T-mobile never offered me one either, ‘cause I am just old enough and anal enough to take one, if it were offered. This seems to be another one of those hideous ways technology has crept in and stolen our ability to take care of ourselves. But that is another discussion and not for today.
The furnace comes on and we remember we do actually have a couple of small propane tanks on the front of this RV we currently reside in. But how much propane do we have? Seems like last year we did not refill either tank. Oh crap! This could be bad. But we did just replace the battery 4 days ago. So as long as it holds up the furnace should run and as long as the propane holds up we’re going to stay warmish. However, with time this idea seems to be sinking. The damn furnace is coming on about every 10 mins or so. Surely, we will run out of propane gas before this weather passes. But we stayed put. Normally power outages don’t last as long as this one has already. This outage has already lasted most of a day. When the first tank runs out of gas my wife goes out to get more but the store is already closed(If it was ever really open). She could of searched for another store that sells propane, if we had internet…anywhere. Seems cell towers need electricity too!
After the failed gas attempt, we knew options were getting rather thin. But it was getting dark. Icy roads and darkness do not mix, so we decided we would try more in the morning. We knew it was possible that the other gas tank would run out before the morning, so we dragged out a couple of sub 30 degrees sleeping bags and put those on the bed over a blanket, a heating blanket(which needs electricity but would have been more work in the cold house to remove), and a sheet. For the first time, all day, we actually got warm. However, that little treat of warmth was rewarded with our morning plans stolen in the night.
It seems that 4 day old battery was not reliable at all. It stopped working and so did the furnace. Around 4 am I got up to go to the bathroom. Any old person out there will believe me when I say this is normal and expected every night. At any rate, I noticed the house was exceptionally cold and that the furnace was not running. It should of been. It was way to cold for it not to be running. I informed my wife and she proceeded to tinker with the thermostat. I think she hoped it was just not working right. But it was not thermostat that was the problem, it was the furnace. After, a little investigating we discovered that the battery had quit working, for the clock it also normally powers, was off too.
I looked at her and said “This house is way to cold for us to stay. We have to leave.”. So we began packing up a few things, knowing probably the only warmth we were going to feel, would be from the car we were going to be getting into. The outside temperature was around 14 degrees. Inside of our RV it was barely better. The wall thermostat said 30 degrees but that cheap thing had never been accurate. In fact history had shown me, that the RV was usually within 6-7 degrees of what it is outside, without any devices (air conditioning or heaters) running to change the temperature. Between the amount of breath I was able to see, the fact I grew up in Iowa and knew what cold weather was and the history of the RVs weather protection, my best educated guess was the house was somewhere around 20 degrees. Truthfully, when you are standing around in pajamas and no coat, cold is cold.
My hands were freezing so bad they burned, before I reached the interior of that warmed up car. But it was not an easy thing to even get to the car. The stairs had to be salted, things to be packed, and a decision of what to do with the cat had to occur. While it was a hard decision, it turned out for the better. Our cat, little miss Jinxy Girl, had no problem with the cold. She was lively and bouncy. And she ran as soon as the pet carrier was taken out. That made the decision to leave her much easier. Not much sense could be seen in getting frostbite trying to get a cat who seemed fine with the cold.
Leaving the cat behind we headed out. We knew that finding a motel was not likely going occur. It is incredibly hard to face a task you know you most likely will fail. There is a reason they call them facts. It is a cold thing to call something. A non emotional name for something that nobody really likes to hear. The facts were many people left before we did. The facts were that all of Texas had experienced this Ice Storm. Facts were that a lot were without power. We learned more of these facts as we traveled down the road and we were able to pickup some internet here and there. Sadly, all of these facts weighed completely against us finding any warmth, anywhere, outside of our vehicle. Every place we stopped and asked was either completely filled up or had no electricity. As town after town and mile upon mile passed, we began to see a very dark picture. The picture grew dark and so did the day, when we finally found a place to stay, it was nearly 7 PM. This place had no water, it had no WiFi, but it had electricity.As a side note, if we had had the cat, we would not have been able to get the room. The heater of our room barely worked, but we managed to stay warm enough until 5am when the power went out.
So we had to leave. You really have no choice. What most people don’t get about the cold is sleep. You cannot sleep! Not because of the cold but because of the lack of a source of dependable heat. If the heat stops working and your place to sleep gets too cold, you are not going to wake up…ever. Your body has to maintain a certain temperature, if it does not then you freeze to death. So when you think of cold and no electricity, think no sleep.
After traveling over 300 miles and stopping at every place along the way only to end up with a motel that had no water and lost power, we decided the better option was to head back towards home. On our way back home, I got a text from the property manger stating that the power has finally been restored, after more than 48 hrs. without power. I am so glad they were fast at getting a community full of RVs and elderly, up and running(sarcasm). Really though, what the hell is wrong with these people at the power company?
Shortly, after getting home and settling back in I learned some damn Texas mayor said people were being lazy about this Ice Storm and I thought to myself, yes, I suppose I was bit lazy. I could of chopped apart my RV and used it as fire material. But the idea never occurred to me. I does make me wonder two things though. Just how stupid do we got to be, to hire an idiot like that, to such an important position. And secondly, I wonder exactly how many people this lazy Mayor invited into his mansion to share in the warmth.
There is no being lazy when your entire state is without power, there is only being desperate enough to drive all day just to stay warm.
We have some warmth for now, but as time has shown us, the power can go back out and has since we came home yesterday. We can only stay as warm as possible, hope we can get some propane somewhere, and lastly, hope this damn cold storm ends.
JB and Jeannie Thomas are 56 and 57 yrs. old respectively. They reside in Richmond, Texas. around 20 miles outside of Houston,Texas.
Axe's Asylum 
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