Over the last week, as with a great swath of the United States, we saw our temperature rise and and then plummet to Winter-like conditions (not surprising, it being early January and all). For us here in New Home, it is one of least most pleasant times of the year (excepting, of course, Summer, that other least most pleasant time of the year).
Sitting as I am, listening to both the heater running inside and the wind blowing outside, it does bring to my mind how utterly dependent we are on climate control technology for comfort, if not actual living.
Our heat here is (thankfully) natural gas as is our stove, so at least if we lose power we have some level of ability to cook - but obviously not blow heat. And I would say our house, for its time of construction, is pretty well insulated although probably not up to modern standards - the question of adding more has been on my mind for a while, but depending on when (and I suppose if) we move, I question how much money we want to put into the house.
Were the power to go out - as it has in the past - things would eventually get very cold or hot indeed. Both have happened in the past, as have minor inconveniences like the air conditioning unit failing due to age. But all of those have been relatively minor events.
But we are fortunate. What happens when there is a long interruption in power in urban areas?
We have seen such things in the recent past in areas that are not really built to endure such things - the Great Freeze of Texas 2021 comes to mind, where power is lost for days at a time in a period of bitter cold. Modern urban construction is not created for this for residential living (nor, frankly, in commercial buildings either), and with so many residential buildings and most especially apartment buildings, you are 100% reliant on the provided power (more and more electric). Once the temperature starts dropping, thermal mass is not your friend (the same problem in reverse for losing power in the summer, especially in climates where it does not cool down at night: do I stay roasting in my 85 degree apartment, or open the windows for the 85 degree outer air?).
The reality is that our urban construction, like so many other aspects of modern life, are built on the underlying assumption of a ready supply of energy (mostly electric) that will overcome for the deficiencies of climate, and the availability of modern materials (along with the technologies to manufacture them and the personnel to install them) that allow energy saving features to be maximized. Take away one or both of those factors, and suddenly the urban environment becomes a lot less inviting, speaking as someone who has had to working in a relatively modern commercial building when the heating or cooling fails inconveniently and there is no other source of heat except huddled around portable heaters or no cooling at all as the windows cannot be opened for some kind of cooler air.
It makes me think of my ancestors who lived in the area of The Ranch but higher up in the mountains. The summers there can still get up to 90 or 100 F, and the winters can drop down into the low 20's with snow. They, in the house that they had built on their land (it stood for almost 100 years before burning in a fire) had no electricity for most if not all of that period, only the physical construction and some kind of fireplace and cooking stove for heat. Likely the house was not insulated and had single pane windows.
How, I am sure the modern world wonders, did they survive.
As most people have throughout history I assume, by adapting to the cold and heat as necessary, dressing more warmly or to cool as needed, finding ways to generate body heat (in the case of my ancestors, hard outside labor will do that for you). And of course, at some level simply being hot or cold and dealing with it.
I do not know that I have some great thought as I ponder all of this, only the simple observation that we continue to build a world based on certain assumptions, and layer on top of it concentrating more and more of the population into places where they are dependent on those assumptions. What happens, I wonder, when those assumptions begin to fail?
Mom's family were crop pickers during the Great Depression, picking winter crops in the south and nearby close states. A lot of cotton, but some food crops as well. This from early 30's to late 1950's. Then they transitioned to some lower professional jobs as the boys went to cities to work in construction.
ReplyDeleteTheir home was sometimes in DIY tarp shelters - tents, but sometimes, the farmer had a garage for them to sleep in. A single light bulb with extension cord was their sole power. No radios. Food cooked on open pits. Very simple life. They did not consider themselves poor as nearly everyone they knew had a very similar life as well.
My father's family had a similar background: when we were driving around last year in the town my father grew up in, he pointed to the place that his uncle and family lived when the first got there - they had put up a tent as well.
DeleteIn talking with my father, I realized that for most of his early life he probably never lived in their own house but in rentals or whatever was provided as they followed the harvesting (mostly fruit in their case). I do not think that he, either, would have considered himself "poor" as all their family and friends lived the same way (just as you relate).
The history is the same: his parents' generation transitioned to more formal jobs as the fruit and agricultural economy changed. Their children went into the trades or skilled labor; their grandchildren die either the trades or went to college.
I grew up on a rural farm where is wasn't unusual to lose power for a week or sometimes two. We were just too far removed to be up further on the list of importance in getting powered restored. Eventually with livestock that had power needs, we did get a tractor powered generator to take care of them though we still remained in the dark. So after I left the farm, it took along time for me to realize that I no longer have to worry about electrical outages in the same way. I think in all the years off the farm, I've been without power for eight hours once but the average is probably closer to an hour or two at a time. Gone, at least for now, are the thoughts of getting some sort of generator like the multi thousand dollar one my neighbor has and uses for an hour or two maybe once every three years or so. She just used it for two hours after the derecho blew through and before power was restored. I sat up for a half hour and then just went to bed early.
ReplyDeleteEd, I think it has a lot to do with your placement not only regionally, but on the lines. Here in New Home, we have lost power from time to time but not for days (yet). In Old Home, this is not an uncommon occurrence and even though my parents are on one of the "main lines", it still happens. In their case they bought a generator which I actually had cause to use last month to power (of all things) the WiFi station so I could work.
DeleteMom and dad were dirt poor Okies. They stayed in OK during the dust bowl. Mom told me stories of the cold and having quilts piled up on the bed to keep them warm at night. A cup of water would be frozen solid by morning. Dad could see the stars through the roof in his bedroom. He woke up at times with hundreds yellow jacket wasps in his bed trying to avoid freezing.
ReplyDeleteDad remembers a snow storm so severe that cows walked over drifts that had frozen and scattered looking for browse. My geometry teacher grew up down the road from my dad, and his dad told him about a rancher that looked out after that storm and saw a flat, white cover. He went looking for his cows, and he could hear them, but not see them. They had been in the lee of a hill, the snow had drifted over them, and the rancher had to dig down to drop hay to them in their snow cave until it melted enough for them to escape.
They didn't know any different. We do. I think that's the problem. We don't know what we are capable of. My house has zero insulation and no central air. I have double hung windows that catch the slightest breeze and channel it through the house. My attic is taller than the room height to keep the heat up and away. In the winter, I hang blankets over door ways to trap stove heat in the kitchen and gas heater heat in the front room if needed. I wear more clothes in the winter and cool cotton in the summer. We didn't have central air in Houston. So I kept a spray bottle of water next to the bed. When it got too hot, I'd squirt it up in the air and let it fall on us. A fan blowing over that did give us some comfort.
It's a matter of what you are willing to put up with, and how you manage with what you have. I think mindset and attitude is 90% of life. Like Edison said, it's 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. It would be nice to have a perfect climate in the house, but not strictly necessary.
STxAR - This is one of things that now I wish I could go back and do, find out from my grandparents what their experiences were. They all were adults during The Great Depression; what a wealth of knowledge they must have had.
DeletePart of the problem that you allude to is that we do not build for climate the way we use to, or learn to live in the climate we are in. There are a reason that houses were different from Britain to Norway to Japan to South Africa; climate and materials determined form and function. But we have become so darned dependent on an ideal life - our houses are all the same (here in the US
, anyway), just as our apartments are.
The Ranch is heavily insulated with double paned windows and fans in almost room; in the Summer, it was rare day that had to turn the air conditioning on and in Winter - really up to last year - the wood stove heated the house most of the Winter.
Mom and Dad were born during the early 30's. I learned a lot from them. Dad's mom quilted with new remnants, but Mom's mom used old shirts, pants, coats, whatever to make her quilts. They were softer and more homey. I'd love to have one now. She had a whole bedroom rigged up with rope and pulleys to make a quilting frame.
DeleteWe washed "tin foil" for reuse until it was worn out. Zip lock bags, too. I still do that. Mom saved scraps of soap in a bucket under the sink. We tried to melt it into usable cakes and it ran us out of the house!!! We ate lunch off the wax paper they used in cereal boxes. She saved jars, cardboard, most everything. Before I was old enough for school, we used to make stained glass with shavings from old crayons pressed between wax paper with an iron. We made houses and churches out of cardboard. She would cut in windows like an advent calendar and glue the crayon windows on them. Kept us entertained on cold or rainy days.
I haven't done this in a while, but I darned socks with a light bulb to hold the shape. Now the elastic seems to wear out before the cloth gets a hole. We snipped buttons off of old clothes. She had a gallon jar full of buttons. She'd use the cloth to make rags, patches, dolls, potholders. I used to make Bible covers out of old jeans.
Dad did all the car service himself and I learned from him. We did our own everything, except digging the hole for our cellar. He hired a backhoe for that. I learned from a friend's dad how to break the bead on a tire with a bumper jack and change my own tires. I used paper sacks to make book covers for school. Even did that in college. When I throw away the included envelopes from the mail, I feel guilty. Mom always saved them. I visited an old home where the walls were covered in cardboard and newspaper. Not sure if it was insulation, wallpaper or used to plug drafts... it was a tinder box.
Basically, you made do with what you had. You reused everything until it was flat out unserviceable, then you found something else it was good for. What we throw away now would have found some use, somewhere.
It can get out of hand. I have to deal with a fair bit of guilt when I throw some things away. But there is only so much room for stuff.
Thanks for sharing STxAR. We shared a lot of similar experiences, it seems.
DeleteSome things I have re-picked up that I did not do before (darning socks comes to mind; in my case they wear out right at the ball of the foot, so easy enough to fix). We continue to rinse out and reuse ziploc bags until the break and parchment paper until it becomes too oily to use.
Junk mail always confuses me these days; I cannot think of a more wasteful use of paper, ink, personnel and fuel to manufacture, distribute, and deliver it, especially as 95% of it simply goes into the recycle bin - yet never once have I heard anyone talk about this as a great waste. I wish I understood what is considered forbidden more carefully.
I am very thankful that we now have a generator (natural gas) that automatically kicks on during a power outage. We live far enough from town that we've often been without power for days at a time (occasionally a week or more). It's one thing to lose a fridge full of stuff, but worse to lose stocked freezers. And, for many years we were on our own water well, which meant no power, no water. At one point we wired the house where we could hook it to our welder if outages went too long, but I'm so happy to have the other setup now. I'm getting old.
ReplyDeleteKelly, this was something my father was looking at two years ago but never did - I had no idea that generators could run on natural gas! They do have it, so it is something to bear in mind. He already had purchased the transfer panel and it is sitting in the garage.
DeleteThey are on a well as well and so had the same issues. With the gas generator (when the power went down), my father would run it to keep the refrigerator, television, and a light going.
Late to the conversation here. As one who has chosen a life without many of the modern conveniences, including indoor environment control, I can tell you that you are correct, it is by adapting. But it requires an attitude that is willing to endure a bit of temporary discomfort or inconvenience in order to adapt.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, there appears to be a huge disconnect between the realities of the resources we choose to use and the lifestyle we desire. From my lowly perch, the solution is amazingly simple, but people have reasons as to why those solutions aren't personally doable for them.
Thank you Leigh.
DeleteI am participating in a rather slow motion lengthy discussion on resource usage, and one of the comments that has stuck with me is that we have experienced a great deal of population growth by exchanging energy for the ability to do it. Without energy, the carrying capacity of pretty much everywhere drops quickly by the simple expedient that food, heat/cooling, can no longer be transported beyond what an animal or person will carry. I have confess it has both given me nightmares and a lot to think about.
There is a huge disconnect - it strikes me as odd, though, that it is from more places than one might think. The assumption seems to be we can still have the same level of lifestyle based on a simple change in "energy". The reality, as your life points out so very clearly, is that it is a much deeper change than that.
TB, I think it's a topic that is extremely easy to be idealistic about, which seems to be a standard starting point for us all. Realism, I would say, comes either through experience (which requires a healthy dose of bravery) or being clever enough to think through all the nuances and consequences (very rare, these days). The middle road is what most people choose, that of token gestures, armchair quarterbacking, and loudly repeating trendy mantras. I suppose because, these things are seen as doing something, as opposed to doing nothing.
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