Nerve Endings Firing Away

Just when I thought that things were at their mundane best in the sleepy town of College Station, we were given a scare last evening. It all started when I noticed voltage fluctuations at Sweet Eugenes’ where I was studying. After a dozen times of bright and dim moments, the power finally conked out. I had never thought that the loss of power can make the surrounding eeringly quiet.

I decided to head home to continue studying but I was caught in long lines of traffic. It was then I realized that this was much serious. None of the businesses/shops had their power turned on. The traffic lights were out and all intersections were transformed to ‘stop sign’ rules. But I again noticed the virtual silence despite the inconvenience. No honking, no speeding, no road rage – something I wouldn’t expect within 100 miles of Houston. The car radio provided the much-needed update on this problem. There was an equipment failure at the Bryan utility station, causing the brownout (as opposed to a blackout) and eventual power shutdown. I managed to reach home without incident and the memories of the Northeast blackout came rushing back Nope, I didn’t live through it but the news made it scary-looking. I resigned myself to a night of darkness and nothing to do but simply sit around doing nothing.

The reliance on electricity is only evident when we lose it (duh!) and although as an Indian this shouldn’t be new to me, I hadn’t experienced this in years. Thankfully, I had couple of candles from the Hurricane Rita days and my laptop had couple of hours of battery juice. Although it is early fall, Texas has just two seasons – hot and warm. It was going to be a long night; so I thought. But I guess, the utility guys moved quick to fix the problem. After more than three hours, we were back up. It was bright again; the refrigerator began humming; the AC rumbled back to life and everything was normal again.

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