Letters: “I Think We’re Going To Need A Bigger Boat…”

Editor:

Appreciated your coverage this weekend as the wind and water levels rose, darkening the house in an attempt to stave off the power outages you were warning us about – right up until the moment the power went out.

For a little while we joked that it was fun to dine by candlelight again (actually one of those expandable survival lanterns that was totally inadequate and did nothing to lend romance to our situation) and meet our de-powered neighbors, but then the grim reality set in.

No TV. No dish or clothes washer. No heat. I looked at our bricked-up fireplace and after I cursed its contribution to our current climate state I would have given a lot to have been able to light a fire in there. Maybe hang an iron pot, make some stew if the outage was prolonged.

Many in our neighborhood left for places with power, some of them lured back with “Your power is back on!” outage updates from PG&E – returning to find out that it was a cruel hoax and they were back playing monopoly in the dark with the rest of us

Eventually – undoubtedly thanks to the hard work of many working with electricity in unforgiving weather – we rejoined the modern world, consoling ourselves with a movie but with an eye on mother’s end-table lamp for telltale signs of flickering.

After the worst was (apparently) over and a legion of workers with blowers and chainsaws turned out to clean things up and spew (none of the equipment we saw was electric) new emissions into the air we left with a profound sadness that despite the pledges and promises of cuts and transparency, we’re nowhere near where we need to be in order to save ourselves.

And after this weekend and a return to movie streaming the only line we could come up with to describe what’s going to happen to us is “we’re going to need a bigger boat.”

Sincerely,

Anders & Kate/ Martinez