Blink -  bang?

Yes, it's official (at least in my book) the rainy season is here a month early this year. How can I tell you ask? - simple, we only have prolonged power outages during the rainy season and at the moment it's been off for over 12 hours. About 9:15 last night everything "blinked" out and about 2 seconds later I heard the "big bang" in the distance telling me a transformer had exploded - or we're under attack by Islamo-fascists.

This being Mexico, you know nothing is going to happen until manana so you might as well go to bed and sleep in late in the morning - at least until the cat, who doesn't care about the power failures, insists you get up because he's hungry - so, get up and feed the cats, but you know what? - - - you know when you can't have something you want it even more? - well so it was with the morning coffee. After throwing the extension cord out the window to the pressure pumphouse to get the weather station back online I carried the coffeemaker out to the casita which is on a different power leg - surprise, no power there either - now I REALLY wanted my coffee so back out to the pool pumphouse and plugged in there. The cats were watching warily from a safe distance as I stood by the coffee maker perking away sitting on the ground by the pool, not exactly "morning coffee by the pool".

As I came back up the stairs the power regulator started beeping as the second power leg dropped to 98volts. I shut down everything and took up residence in my deep thinking chair. I decided there were many things that could be done without power like study my Spanish, or use the little battery powered pump to fill my low spare tire - that sounded better than studying.

At this point the power has been off for nearly 13 hours and I'm a bit concerned, I've not opened the frig for any reason, but if the freezer thaws I'll be eating spaghetti morning, noon and night for the next 14 days due to the ample supply my generous neighbor cooked up for me before fleeing to the great frozen north.

As they say, "Mexico, love it or leave it" - but the front gate power is off, so can't leave it at the moment.

As I was sitting on the terazza drinking my coffee my thoughts drifted back to about 1954 when I would have been 10-11 years old. What has this to do with "no power"? - nothing, but it's interesting how sometimes I now have the "luxury" of remembering things from 50 years ago because my mind isn't cluttered with working etc. Anyway we lived in a small town in NE and beyond the east city limits (yes, we had them in those days) there was a swimming pool and combination indoor roller skating rink and dance hall. I think it was called Jensen's, or Hanson's - or maybe nothing close? We'd ride our bikes out to a gas station on the highway and leave them near the fence that separated the adjoining pasture. Of course we didn't lock the bikes, no one would bother them in those days and it was perfectly normal for a 10 year old kid to be off on his own, nobody thought twice, it was all part of growing up.

The reason we parked the bikes there was that going by road would have taken maybe another mile, while cutting across the pasture made it an easy walk. Someone had built a set of steps to make getting over the barbed wire fence easier and so, rolled up towel and swimming trunks in hand with our season pass we'd head toward the creek. There, a big old tree had fallen across the creek and made a perfect bridge. I don't remember that there were any sort of railings, who needs them? Then on up the hill to the pool and check in and get your clothes basket. In the locker room I can almost still smell the chlorine and see the blue green painted walls. The basket had a big safety pin with a number, you pinned that to your trunks and they stored the clothes basket until it was time to leave.

We spent the days swimming and laying in the sun getting vicious sun burns (which I suppose means I'll one day have skin cancer?) because, of course, no one had even imagined sun screen at that time. After a burn or two and mandatory peeling (to gross out your little sister) you took on a nice tanned leather colored patina for the summer. How safe, how simple and easy were those days and years so long ago - but only yesterday in my memories.

Oh, something else I just remembered and retrieved from a box of "stuff from my life" is the registration for our car we had then, it's still in the plastic holder with the elastic band for attaching it around the steering column. It's dated Feb 14, 1955 and is for a 1949 Kaiser, total registration fee: $8.

No power yet, guess I need to think up something else to put off studying my Spanish.

PS: Good things eventually come to those who wait, even in Mexico, and sure enough the CFE has returned us to the 21st century (well, maybe the 20th) and restored our electricity, you can tell it's true or you wouldn't be reading this!