Open Refrigerator Door Policy

I didn't think. I was a teenager at the time, and sometimes not everything was carefully thought out.

My parents had a second refrigerator/freezer that they kept in the basement, and I decided I wanted something from it, probably an ice cream treat and a soda.  Or, as we called it in Michigan, a pop.  I would like to say that it was only as a teenager did I indulge in pop, but my love of carbonated drinks has continued to this day, for better or worse.

It wasn't until many hours later that my Mom found out that I did not close the door to the refrigerator/freezer.  Everything in it had gone bad.  Not surprisingly, she was very upset.    Their son, whom they thought was growing into a responsible adult, proved otherwise.

At that point, I did the only responsible thing I could think to do.  It crossed my mind to blame my sister or the dog, but instead I owned up to it.  And I took my savings earned from summer and after-school employment, and re-stocked the refrigerator.  Even at mid-70s prices, it amounted to well over $100 (accounting for inflation, in today's dollars that's probably about a billion  - well, maybe not that much, but you get what I mean).

As time passed, I did much better with refrigerator responsibilities.  Now, as a budding senior citizen, I'm helped by the refrigerator making beeping sounds when I forget and leave it open.  Where was that technology when I was a teenager?

Sometimes you can be good, though, and it still not help.  Such is the case when Tropical Storm Irma gales by and disrupts your power for 55 hours.  Sitting in the dark, knowing you can't open the refrigerator, living off what's in the pantry, or what can be heated on the gas burner of the outdoor grill, it was an interesting time of living off the grid.

Right after the storm faded, Alison and I walked the neighborhood to survey the damage.  I noticed a strange whirring engine sound coming from the porches of many of our neighborhoods.  What the heck was that?  Well, they're generators, and over half the houses seem to have them.  I'd heard a co-worker talk about them (storm lesson one: don't look for a generator the day before a big storm is supposed to come through), but mostly I knew them from television, like how a hospital's powers shuts off and a minute later everything is back on, and they say, "Oh, the generators kicked in!", and then the surgeon realizes he's taking out the wrong organ and quickly makes corrections.

Too late to save our  refrigerator contents, we had a friend willing to take the meats we had in the freezer and store them in their generator-protected freezer. It was just one plastic bag full of organic meats we had recently bought at a local farmer's market, but we were glad to save them.  Before we opened the freezer to take them out, I absentmindedly opened the refrigerator,  and almost passed out from the foul stench that emanated from it.

When the power came back on, I really wanted to handle it like CSI, with a hazmat suit, but I just held my nose and dumped out the contents as quickly as possible.  Fortunately, we don't overstock, and we only had the one refrigerator/freezer.  Out total losses were only around $40 (in 1970s dollars, that's probably about three pennies - well, probably not that little, but you get what I mean).

Seeing so many of our neighbors, out and about, talking and sharing, helping each other, was a beautiful thing.  Political and religious differences, shyness and the self-absorbed busyness of our lives, all disappeared in the aftermath of the storm.  And it took a little while, because so many were in need, but when the power and internet people came, they came in fleet force strength, and operated quickly and efficiently in getting us back up and running.

Now that the crisis is over, I ask myself - will I join the generator army?  I'm not sure.  We don't have multiple freezers and such like many have. So I still don't know if I can justify the cost.  A $400 generator to save $40 worth of food?  I don't know.

On a selfish note, I would have liked to kept the TV up and running.  You know, I have to keep up with what that surgeon is up to.  Hey, Doctor!  That's not an appendix - that's a liver!

Meanwhile, I haven't gotten over that odor yet.  Whenever I go to open up the refrigerator door, I hear the Jaws theme in my head as I approach it.  Oh, well.  At least it's helping me remember to quickly close it back up.