Brownout

It's been more than a week since Typhoon Milenyo hit Metromanila but we're still experiencing power shortages. Today is another workday gone to waste because the power went off at a little past 10 am. What a great way to start a day, right?

Hmm, let's see what I can do about this. I thought of all the people I owed a text message and sent each of them one. I also opened a window to get enough light to manually write down a draft of the first report on my to-do list. After an hour or so, that was it. I could do nothing else. Files I needed to refer to were all in the computer.

When I'm thinking about a zillion things I want to do but WON'T be able to, I marvel about how people did things before electricity was discovered. Then I snap back to reality and tell myself not to panic! After all, this situation is beyond my control. I'm not the only one worrying about delays and unmet deadlines.

Brownouts remind me that life has lots of interruptions. Some are divine (acts of God we call them, such as typhoons), others are caused by man (like the despicable thieves of wire cables and transformers). Interruptions and unscheduled pauses make me think about the "Be still and know that I am God" passage in Psalm 46. [Didn't that psalm describe a natural disaster in the first verses?] Then I wait for the power to return.