Power Trip - How Helpless Could We Be

I was running my last few laps on the threadmill in my gym, watching the news and listening with intent on the latest news of the financial market and how it was all going topsy turvy, when the electricity went out abruptly without warning while I was doing 14 mph on the treadmill. I escaped smashing my face against the wall only because I slammed my ribs onto the control console first. After a few minutes of swearing and cursing and uttering words which I myself did not realise exists I staggered off the treadmill, clutching my throbbing midsection and a wounded ego. 

This is the second time that a power trip had had occured in the office building that day. A building as vital an installation as I am at, I gives me wonder how vulnerable we are to the whim of electricity. The office doors that used to be shut closed obscuring the outside world from seeing what was going on inside, all of  the sudden opened one by one. A group of the 'NS' (national servicemen) guys kicked a football made out of newspaper crunched together, in between the cubicles to pass the time. The older group took the opportunity to make their way to the near by coffesshop across the road to grab an early lunch or shall I say an extended lunch. Even those who usually had eBuddy or Facebook as a clandestine distraction were interrupted. One of my guys approached me to brief me about the power situation and their whereabouts. Not that I could stop  them from leaving the office, I decided to stay in the gymnasium and get some cardio done to let off steam.

As I sat in the darkened room with the only source of light coming in from the window in the far end of the room and the temperature slowly but steadily rising, and in those moments of uncertainty, I made an elementary yet vital observation: In a well-oiled society like ours, famed for its efficiency, it appears that power (in this case, in the form of electricity) is what that gives our society the sense of order and when that power is taken away, chaos (in the form of employees playing hooky and performing disappearing acts even better than Houdini could) begins to creep in – the very inception of apocalyptic fiction. 

As people, we’ve continued to function well despite of all the kinds of externalities that had occurred: power failures, epidemics, recession, fugitives escape, road closures, ERP introduction and politics. Those incidences seems to have very little effect in our society as we continued on with or daily work like a 'well-oiled machine'. Those problems seems to just glide off us whilst others stick like a sore thumb in other countries. I wondered what would constitute the proverbial straw that would break the camel’s back. What if the power failure had been long drawn and if it had affected the whole country? What scale of chaos would we have to endure?

I decided to wind up my cardio as working out in the dark seems to give me the creep and I could not see what I was doing. I head off to the shower and had to endure a quick cold shower. Yet another luxury that we had taken for granted. Whilst with the hot shower I could have spent 15 minutes under the  tap doing absolutely nothing, a cold shower send me running for the towels in seconds. 

When I got back to my desk, I still couldn’t turn on the computer, it lay dead on the table lifeless. I began to wonder the amount of emails that will appear on my email by the time the power is up and shudders at the thought of yet another late hours in office. I was closed to calling it a day and wrapping things early instead but I spotted some work that had been left for me to proofread and some files begging and shouting for me to clear. I picked up my pen and got cracking. 

Sure, the computer wasn’t working and all the other gizmos that we were so used to daily weren't operating, but it wasn’t its responsibility to do my job. They are but a means to meet the end. That responsibility was still mine. So with or without electricity, those work still needed to be cleared. I spent the next 4 hours in the dark clearing one file at a time.