October 8, 2002
An Ode to Electricity? ... Let's take five with Moira Gunn. This is "Five Minutes".
Due to a series of mishaps of no consequence in themselves, I sit here at home without electricity, penning my commentary on a notepad. I certainly can't tax my trusty laptop; I must protect its batteries like a mother bear with her cub.
It's the morning of the second day of my darkness, and the nice young supervisor at the utility company has absolutely promised a truck will be arriving shortly, some time in the next 12 hours. How he can even promise this is unclear, since the dispatch computer has been down about a day, and he has no way of confirming whether or not - in his jargon - my "order" has even "dispatched."
In the course of this odyssey I have made many new acquaintances, and this is based solely on the fact that I cannot contact any individual customer service representative. I am also repeatedly informed that they cannot call me.
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While I suffer this oh-so-modern experience of 800 number-"anyone here can help you" hell, I live without electricity.
But I'm not out of energy altogether. The phone company supplies its own power, so I can call anyone I'd like, and that's actually lucky for the electricity people. If I had to leave my home to have all these conversations, I would be even less pleasant than I have managed to be.
As it is, my gas is still on, so I've enjoyed a nice hot bath, had a bracing cup of coffee from water I boiled myself on the stove, and I'm warmed by heat from my furnace.
But make no mistake, there still is ongoing drama. Living in power limbo, along with my laptop, is my cell phone. The person at the utilities company said he'd much prefer to contact me through that number, but having just returned from two days of travel, I told him it really needed to be charged. I'm still pondering a comeback to his reply: "Yes, but it will always be with you."
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This whole experience is rather like "camping out in the urban." Some things can't be done, while others move from one venue to another. Some comforts survive unscathed, while others must be done without. While I'm still in the honeymoon period, its joys are fading fast.
Yes, "Oh, gods of electricity, I appreciate you; I really do." But since I have your ear, I must bring up the 800-number hell business. It seems that your organization, like so many others, has been lulled into thinking they deliver customer service if they simply use their computers to trace the status of your complaint. Each time you re-explain your problem in detail, they say, "Yes, I see that right here in the file."
The false premise lies in believing that with data on file, anyone can take the next step. But this is only an information chain; there must also be a responsibility and action chain.
Unfortunately, that's all I have time to explain right now. My son has picked up his dormant video game player and headed out to a friend's house for the night, the light is waning, and I'm thinking - soup, yes, I could warm up a can of soup - not in the microwave, but rather on my stove.
I'm Moira Gunn. This is Five Minutes.
