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It is hard to imagine surviving in an ice storm with 75 dogs in a dog rescue; it is even harder to image surviving for 19 consecutive days without power in a state that required $109 million dollars in federal assistance for winter storm recovery efforts. When the storm struck on December 29-30, 2006, over 30,000 utility customers were without electrical power, and we were one of them.

The problem was, without electricity we did not have any heat or water, and we lived about half an hour from the larger towns, fifteen minutes from a little town that was in as bad of a situation as we were. The first emergency situation we knew we had to deal with was our 75 dogs we cared for. The little ones and the "fragile" we felt were in high medical conditions were already inside, and we brought in the remaining ones we felt could not handle the extreme cold: Rat Terriers, Toy Cocka' Poos, Cairn Terriers, Chihuahuas, Yorkies, and small mixed breeds. The ones outside who had plenty of straw and igloo dog houses were safe and had heavy coats of fur: Shiba Inues, miniature American Eskimos, Cocker Spaniels, Wire Hired Fox Terriers, and such.

The first priority was to get water to them, and we did not have any at our place. Our neighbors were about three miles away, having two outside water hydrants that did not run off electricity, so for the entire days with no power we hauled five-gallon buckets from their place two times a day. To be truthful, nobody in the area knew how bad it was because we did not have any television or radios. Most of the cars or pickup did not work due to the freezing cold weather, and very few made it to town because of icy roads. Over the days, news did begin to trickle in about the statewide devastation, causing most of us to begin to worry a bit.

No work was available as the surrounding towns were without power, and the area we lived in was a long way off from the main towns which we knew would receive the first trickling of emergency care. The deep freezes after a week or so were thawing the ice as the temperature began to thaw, which was causing severe tree breakages to occur. Landing all over the land, in the dog kennels, and on the buildings, it looked like a dilapidated war zone.

Once we got our van started, we two 60-something tired ol' women headed down the road with every bucket we could find, prepared to get water from our neighbor. We had a cell phone, so we could stay in contact with them and our family. The problem was our family in the city had lost their phones and power also, so staying in touch with them was on a touch and go basis. We and the neighbors had more or less formed a support group for each other  - what we had was theirs and what they had was ours. Without it, we would not have mentally or emotionally made it for sure.

Over the days, we struggled as the road was sheer ice and the going was slow back and forth to get water in the early mornings, but it was done out of necessity. The problem we had was getting into the outdoor pens. The snow and ice was melting during the days and the gates were frozen down to the ground by early morning and late evenings, so we needed to get a tall step-ladder to get into them. A feat of difficulty, these two agile acts had to be done very carefully to maintain the water to the dog in addition to their feeding. The straw and hay was easy, as we would wait until the middle of the day when the weather was warmer to get in to clean the pens and check on bedding, but we could not just water them once a day or they would dehydrate over time.

Inside the house was another matter, as we had no stove to cook or heat with. Many of our dogs were very elderly and ill, which required broth, boiled meat and softened food. So a neighbor had an old kerosene heater he had stored in his barn that he loaned us. The Salvation Army and Red Cross had energy assistance for anybody with generator heaters, so a bunch of us women grouped up and went to town in one vehicle (safety in numbers, you know). A hot lunch was also donated at the town church for those of us who had no heat and inadequate methods to cook meals. A more welcome meal was never had, believe me!

The fuel station had been almost out of fuel, but we were able to get enough to run the stove. We developed a pattern where we would place an extremely large soup pan of water on top of the little stove and wait until it got hot. We would place rice in it and small bits of chicken or some form of meat and allow it to cook all day and night. By the next morning, it would be done enough for us to have a bowl of hot soup at lunch; once we were done eating, we would mix dry dog food in it and feed both indoor and our outside dogs. This developed into a routine and worked to the benefit of all of us here. We would each get one hot meal a day that way, able to munch on cold foods the rest of the time to keep our energy up.

Depressive, yet, but we survived in a mindless manner of survival. Once word got out, help slowly began coming in through people from all over the state. We were the center where bread, food, cookies, etc. were dropped by for anyone in need. Bread was brought in from the bread stores for anyone who needed it, with day old and damaged breads donated to our dogs by the pickup loads (they since think this is a treat) so the dog food was able to stretch further. We were the last house to have our power turned on 19 days later, because of the way the poles were routed.

Those days are now over, thank goodness, but we learned about friendship, bonding, and helping one another that I never knew existed in today's times. To all of those who helped, God bless each one of you, especially the electrical power crews who were up on those poles in the middle of freezing winds 24 hours a day to help us get our electricity turned back on. You will never know how much you were appreciated and loved to this day.