all write, already! (m)

Lyn told me to write.  She fears we will lose readership.  Yeah, like the 18 people signed in on the blog are waiting with baited breath to hear the latest installment of our lives. I doubt you've even noticed my absence given all the postings of Alexander's baby pictures to entertain you (he was adorable).

Where do I begin?  October was the month that wouldn't end.  On that last weekend, we went to a major dinner/fundraiser at Harrison's school.  I had just finished the presentation to the Board of the medical school that week and was in the mood to relax and be social.  The event was held on the night of the freaky snow/windstorm.  While the weather outside was frightful, it was cozy and warm inside.  Somewhere in the middle of my Thai-themed cocktail, my cell phone went off.  My neighbor, aka Gladys Kravitz (from Bewitched):  "M...watch out coming home.  A 60-foot tree fell across our street."  Who cares?  No one was hurt and the tree fell on the cul-de-sac, well before my driveway.  I had a glass of wine and enjoyed the rest of the evening.

Driving home, the wind was gusting 50 miles per hour.  As we got further away from Cambridge and closer to our home, we noticed an accumulation of snow.  Thought little of it.

Pull into our street and it's pitch black.  We lost power.  Harrison is sitting in the house, working on college applications with the light from a lantern. 

By morning, the power had not returned.  I had a dream that I fell asleep in a fire station but realized the piercing sound of alarms was coming from our home which woke us out of a dead sleep at 5 a.m.  Thirty minutes of non-stop blaring later, my husband cut the wires to shut the system off.

Little did we know on Sunday morning that this storm was no ordinary storm.  We lost major trees on the property as well as the phone, internet, heat, electricity and television.  This lasted FIVE DAYS.

We bought a back-up generator as a gift to each other one Christmas.  The thing kicked in and lit a couple of rooms, the refrigerator and the garage doors.  Heat in two rooms.  With the light shining from the kitchen window, we attracted neighbors to our home much like Mary and Joseph following the North Star.  Some came to warm up.  Some brought their children in to do homework. One kid had pneumonia.  Some just left their cell phones to charge up rather than sit in a car and wait for them to charge that way.  I had no oven and the stove smelled of gas when I turned it on.  Someone told me to throw a match in the range to see if we could get it going.  I tossed a lit match in and BOOM...a flame!  I felt like the person who discovered fire.  We cooked for everyone...a family of five, my three...using whatever was on hand.

On Monday, while resting my feet from decorating the cafeteria at Harrison's school for Halloween, my cell phone goes off.  It's my husband's best friend.  They just got back from South Africa and have no power. Can they stay with us?  I explain my situation but tell them they are welcome to stay with us and share the little heat and limited power.

They arrive at 6 p.m. with a turquoise Le Crueset pot full of braised beef short ribs and a canvas tote with individual compartments for six bottles of wine.  It was like a Yuppie sit-in.  They have a wine cellar to rival the best restaurants and brought a sampling of some bottles "for fun."  Fun to me is not wine.  Cannolis, maybe.  Dark chocolate, definitely.  Wine, no.

The wife arrived with a bandage across her nose and two black eyes.  She said she fell again because of her fuzzy socks on her hardwood floor.  I suggested it might also be the four glasses of wine she consumes before bed each evening. 

They stayed until Thursday and we enjoyed their company very much.  We laughed and drank wine every night.  It was a bit like vacation, I'm not going to lie.  During the days, we shopped at Filene's Basement which is closing.  I spent $558 on two tuxedos, tux shirts, shoes and accessories for the boys.  Four cashmere sweaters for me and a pair of Cole Haan shoes for T.  The receipt said I saved $1,440.00

Wouldn't it be nice if Weight Watchers tallied up everything you ate in a day ...instead of what you wanted to eat...and told you what you saved in points?  Just a thought.