They forecasted a big storm. Ice. Snow. Buried and stranded. We might lose power for days, even weeks.

Dire warnings abounded. People remembered the ice storm of 2015 or 2006 or 2002.

“My college canceled classes for a month.”

“Cataclysmic! Catastrophic ice damage!”

“We had a house fire.”

Don’t mess around! Take this seriously. This is the Big One, people!

“You need food and water for seven days.”

But guess what: it wasn’t the Big One.

I spent a lot of time—so much time—preparing for it to be the Big One. I stole hours, days, from other things and from other presence in anticipation of this Big One.

The storm touched half of all Americans and less than one percent of those impacted lost power. Damage, delays, closures—sure, all of that.

But nothing like the apocalyptic forecast.

And here I find myself disappointed.

Not that I want death and destruction and disruption. Genuinely I do not.

The prayers I prayed for the safety of my family: those prayers were answered. So I’m grateful!

But I’m disappointed that I wasted so much, exhausted so much, spent so much and preparing for something. that. was. not.

On top of that, perhaps more than that, I long for a break from the hum of the Machine. I yearn for liberation from the grip of the age of connectivity and technivitiy and instant modern convenience.

I thought maybe a power outage, with all its inconvenience, would bring a blessing in tandem. Slow down. Pause. Notice. A chance for us to begin to see that we’re fish in water who don’t see the water.

Because this is not how we are supposed to live, this on-demand life of self gratifying: stuff, media, me-worshipping algorithms, selfieish cameras on our phones. This world, in the name of freedom, but for the sake of harvesting our souls, gives the facade of having been reordered with us as the shining sun star center. And though we suspect the truth, that doesn’t really revolve around us, the mirror beauty is so attractive, the ease is so easy, the echo chambers are so satisfying that we can’t get free of it, we can’t see it properly, we reach for our device, slave to the impulse, another ping ding dang, and we can’t escape its syrupy stranglehold.

So deep down in me, somewhere, when I hear about these storms or chaotic sweepouts, something leaps for joy. My heart raises its eyebrows with curiosity. Freedom? Freedom! Freedom is at hand!

But the revolution never came. Not this time around it didn’t.

It was a big fat icy fart.

So, again, back to the same old miserable, slogging battlefield: if my revolution is going to come, it must come from within. The stranglehold of self must be broken inch by inch, self-denial by self-denial.

A harder task than getting through a few days without electricity.