“Irene, you were such an annoyance and inconvenience”

Hurricane Irene was kinder to me than it was to many people in the New Jersey/New York area. I didn’t sustain any damage or flooding. It just resulted in some annoyances and inconveniences.

Fearing that strong winds or a tornado might tear off the roof and blow out some windows, my wife and I decided to sleep in our living room rather than our bedroom Saturday night. When the power went out at 2:25 Sunday morning, our home’s security system began beeping annoyingly every half hour or so, ending any hope we had of a decent night’s sleep. We learned hours later the system’s backup battery was dead, so I had to open the control box with a screwdriver and disconnect the expired battery to stop the relentless beeping. Peace…for a little while.

Perhaps jealous at the attention the security system received, a smoke detector in the master bedroom decided to start beeping every few seconds. Of course, it was the only smoke detector we couldn’t reach with one of our ladders. After listening to it all of Sunday, hoping unsuccessfully it would wear itself out, my sons and I walked down the street to borrow a neighbor’s tall ladder. With the aid of a flashlight, we were able to replace the dead backup battery and stop its incessant chirping -- and, get a fair night’s sleep.

Of course, having no power in the house meant we had no working lights, microwave, toaster, home entertainment system, telephone, TV or – gasp – internet connection. Fortunately, since our cars worked, one of my sons and I were able to drive to a café that hadn’t lost power and get some work done while recharging our batteries (figuratively and literally).

Before leaving, realizing food in our refrigerators was on the verge of going bad, I decided to barbecue chicken on our outdoor grill. Why not – isn’t that a good post-hurricane breakfast in suburban New Jersey? One of my sons appreciated it that morning, and the rest of our family did for the rest of the week, until we just got plain tired of it and swore off eating chicken again any time soon.

Eventually, the remaining contents of our refrigerators had to be put in the garbage. Truthfully, some of it already belonged there. But, it was annoying to throw away yogurt, hummus, frozen vegetables and meats, including a beef loin butt tender marked at $50.77. I guess we should be grateful that our town had a special garbage pickup for spoiled food a few days later.

By the time power returned to our home at 3:15 AM Wednesday, our family gained a new appreciation for the value of sunlight and candles to our ancestors. We discovered how challenging it is to shower in darkness and even how difficult it is to read by candlelight. It was nice sitting around and talking to each other without electronic distractions for a while, but…enough is enough – we went to bed early every evening. Let people have the power, already!

Seeing the destruction and erosion it caused in parts of the Jersey Shore a few days later, I’m grateful Hurricane Irene was just an annoyance and inconvenience in my Mercer County neighborhood. I’ll file it away among my life experiences, alongside the November 9, 1965 blackout, which is the only time I recall seeing candles lit in my family’s New York City apartment. If I don’t have another experience like Irene for another 45 years, though, that will be just fine.