THE GREAT BLIZZARD OF 2021

Technically it wasn’t really a blizzard as a blizzard has to have continuous high winds and snow.  Maybe it was a Blue Norther or just a plain old Snow Storm.  But I don’t think that either term really works for what we experienced.  The best description I can come up with is what my father-in-law would call a “cold spell” with two major (for us) snow falls, some icing, periodic winds, and several days of really, really cold weather.  I’ve been hanging around Honey Grove and Dial Community since the early sixties, and my wife, Sandra’s roots go long and deep.  Neither of us can remember any other weather episode quite like this.  Yes, we’ve probably had more snow at some time or other, and I know we’ve had more ice (remember the really bad ice storm 5 or 6 years ago), and we’ve had some cold, cold days….but nothing like what we just went through.  The weather records for Honey Grove show that the temperature dipped below freezing early in the morning of February 11, hit an all time low of -5% on February 16, and did not return to a balmy 37% until Friday, February 19.  That’s a really long time to have the ear muffs on.  As with many natural tragedies, the consequences were far worse than the event itself.  Snow, even with its low temperatures can be fun…for awhile.  And show me a Texan that isn’t used to the wind.  While I don’t particularly like it, a short period of freezing temperatures can be tolerated.  

The interesting thing about this one was that we had plenty of warning.  And the warnings all came to be just about exactly as forecasted.  We had plenty of time to prepare, and many, not all of us, did.  I made sure all vehicles had full tanks.  I checked the propane tank and ordered another 300 gallons and I tested our  back up power generator.   I made an early trip to Brookshire’s in Commerce and loaded up with the essentials.  I bought a couple three pound bags of frozen chicken breasts, six pounds of ground meat, four cans of Spam, two boxes of Wick Fowler’s 2 Alarm Chili mix, and a half dozen cans of Bush’s pinto beans.  I was ready for anything in the kitchen….so long as I had electricity, water and propane.

I checked the house over and made sure all under cabinet sink doors were open, all faucets at a trickle, and jacked the thermostats up to 72 degrees.  I closed all the curtains and blinds to keep the heat in and the cold out.  I was taking no chances on a Texas deep freeze putting me out of commission.   But of course it didn’t happen exactly that way.  It seldom does.

Yes, it got cold and it snowed, and it got colder and it snowed some more.  But my preparations worked.  At least, for a while.  When the electricity went out, my generator kicked in.  We had light, heat, and water.  I made a big pot of chili to celebrate.  But then the electricity, which isn’t even very stable in a spring thunderstorm, kept going out and the generator kept coming on.  Thing one small detail I didn’t plan on was how much propane a 25 kilowatt generator will soak up.  By the time I thought to go check how much propane we had left the second snow had drifted over the area where our generator was buried.  After some serious digging and probing in a two foot drift, we located and uncovered the lid, pried it open dusted off the gauge and saw that we had only about 20% remaining.  The last time I had checked it showed 50%.  We were using about 7% or about 70 gallons a day.  At this rate we wouldn’t last the weekend.  After calling McGraw’s and every other propane supplier in a 50 mile radius I sadly realized that my odds of getting more propane anytime soon were slim indeed.  

My plan B was to go into emergency conservation mode which, in retrospect, I should have done from the beginning.  Turn off the heat in all areas of the house except the living area kitchen, and one bedroom and even reduce those to 60%. Turn off the gas fireplaces we had been using because they looked good, stock up on firewood for our one wood burning fireplace, even though I found later that it probably suck more heat out of the room than it created.  We added layers of clothing, hunted for and found our old stocking hats and ate another bowl or two of chili.  And hunkered down.  

We ultimately did get a partial resupply of propane delivered at 8:00 one night.  The team at McGraw did heroic work throughout.  Not just for us, but for everyone.  That’s the thing about small towns and living in the country.  People really do care.  I cherish every one of the phone calls, texts and emails from friends, neighbors and family wanting to check on us.  Many wanted to know if we needed anything.  More than one offered us a place to sleep if we did run out of propane and the heat and lights went out.  

I know that many had it far worse that we did, but I’ll bet they had offers of help as well.  To tell you the truth, when the sun finally came out and we could make it out of our drive, we drove around Dial thinking how lucky we were to live here.