The Power of Powerlessness
After a spring snow storm last Monday night that was so heavy and wet that it felled two hundred-year-old lilacs in our yard, took down power in half our county, and destroyed trees across central New York, we were so very excited that at least on Wednesday, there would be sun. And that sun would feed our solar panels, which would feed our Tesla Powerwall, which would restore power to our house, at least for a few daylight hours. Instead, after many calls to Tesla, we were told that unfortunately, the battery doesn’t have enough power to restart the solar converter, and that if the battery continues to lose power and gets to say, zero charge left, it will be rendered completely unusable ever.
We were told by the powers that be that we would be without power until Friday at 11:30 pm. Five days of no power after a year of powerlessness. Powerless to stop my father from getting COVID. Powerless to stop him from dying. Powerless to stop the Lyme disease that wracked my body for months. Powerless to stop my mom from falling and shattering her hip. Chronicling all the things over which I have no power can quickly turn from a year of powerlessness into a lifetime of powerlessness, with only fleeting moments of believing I had any power at all.
Wednesday morning, I ran into a friend at the local gym which had been gracious enough to let us wayward powerless people use their facilities and take showers. “We’re not supposed to have power until late Thursday night,” my friend said. She was smiling and bubbly when she said it. She used to scare me a little, she seemed disapproving of me. But then one day, like a switch had flipped, she was incredibly friendly toward me and has been ever since, leaving me to wonder if the sideways glances and puzzled looks were all in my head.
“What are you going to do about the food?” I asked her, standing by a locker, wrapped in a towel and thinking about my chest freezer full of meat, ridiculously expensive cat food, and a whole duck.
“I just assume it’s all going bad,” she said, still smiling, showing an unnatural lack of anxiety about it all. It seemed like a super power to me.
“I’m going to adopt your attitude,” I announced. She just laughed.
I went home and figured out how I could both prepare the food I would be bringing to the retreat I was running in New York City that weekend – coq au vin, marinated flank steak, triturati – but also, how to keep it all cold until I could get it into working refrigeration. I was channeling my friend and feeling pretty zen. I was going to make this work.
I got to the city and everything seemed to be going like clockwork, our power upstate was even restored early. And then I got the call Friday morning. A COVID exposure and a decision to make about whether or not to go forward with the retreat. Ultimately, with the help of the participants, the decision was made to postpone. Nothing, absolutely nothing, went according to plan last week. And I was powerless to change that. I was thrown for sure, but that final realization of powerlessness also had a strange and empowering effect.
Powerlessness empowered my husband and I to play board games in front of the fire. It empowered leisurely meals with good friends. It empowered miles of walking. It empowered cathartic, unstoppable tears on the anniversary of my dad’s death while sitting in the audience of Mrs. Doubtfire the Musical, leaving the people around me rather confused. And then it empowered more tears later while being treated by a dear friend to the tasting menu at 11 Madison, leaving the waitstaff less confused than they probably should have been and leaving me to wonder if people just openly weep on a regular basis over the deliciousness of it all.
In my Changing the Story workshops, I have focused on dichotomies: where we’ve been and where we’re headed, what we’re releasing and what we’re calling in, how we’ve told the story and how we might rewrite it. This week, I realized there’s a third option. The option to ride the wave coming at you rather than try to duck under or jump over. The option to get right with what is. The option to assume that the food is going to spoil and know that there’s not much you can do about that but enjoy the food that you have.
