We’re in light and in heat (no pun intended)!  And it feels so very good.  And warm. And light.  And warm and light.

Last night was the nadir for us.  I came home late from volunteering at my firm for an Election Protection hotline, answering calls from New Jersey voters who were mostly confused about whether they were properly registered or where they should vote given all of the post-storm chaos in the state.  It was a terrific feeling to be able to give back a little bit, especially to people who went through so much – despite losing their homes or being displaced – in order to exercise their power to vote.

When I finally returned to the very dark house, it was about 47 degrees inside. The granite kitchen countertop was so cold that we could have opened a Coldstone Creamery franchise.  I could see my breath. The girls were sleeping, buried under the covers.  But I couldn’t get to sleep because I had to know before closing my eyes that Obama had been reelected.  Because if I still didn’t have power, I sure as hell needed Obama to win.  Fortunately, the race wasn’t as close as the useless pundits predicted, other than Nate Silver (my new hero), whose reasoned mathematical and statistical analyses over the last several months managed to keep me calm when Romney was at his best (or worst, depending on your point of view).  At the end of the day, numbers don’t lie.

While obsessively trying to obtain the latest information on various Web sites, my hands were freezing. And I started to shiver.  And I wondered whether we’d all wake up with small icicles on our eyebrows. But we didn’t.  It was incredibly cold in the house this morning and I had decided as I left for work that there was no way in hell we’d spend another cold and dark night in the house.

As I was leaving, I saw a couple of utility workers from Entergy parked in front of the house.  They were from Arkansas and they’re also my heroes today.  They let us know in their southern drawl that they had identified the problem and that we’d have power back today.  And sure enough, about an hour   later it was “let there be light!”  Just like in the Bible if, unlike me, you believe in that stuff, except in this case, it took a few days longer for us to get our power back than it did for god to allegedly create the world.  Go figure.

So, I am now going to end this dreary chapter – as it snows, by the way – with the fervent hope that all of those people who are suffering exponentially more than we ever did are able to put their lives back together soon.  And with a couple of photos of the girls in their Halloween costumes (Chloe is the mime on the right).