Hurricane and Went

When I was 10 or 11, there was a big hurricane that hit the Jersey Shore in the summertime. The firemen came to our door and told us to evacuate to the local public school basement, which was inland by a few blocks, so Mom packed our pajamas, sleeping bags and some dolls and snacks and off we went. Each family staked out their little 7x7 foot plot on the gymnasium floor, and they opened up the equipment closet for us so that we could play with the scooters and kickballs while the men stood in raincoats at the door, watching the wind and the rain absorb the air sideways. It was exciting to be in a strange school at night playing with phys-ed equipment, staying up way past our usual bedtimes. In the morning we returned to our rental homes and resumed our summers, blissfully unaware of any flooding or hardship that others may have endured. I remember that night fondly as do many of my friends who are now parents themselves, staying at the beach for the summer with their children. So when we heard there was a hurricane coming, we became excited, even nostalgic. We’d stay down to watch the sideways rain and hear the wind rattle out shutters and then walk the beach in the morning looking for sea glass, trying to identify who’s porch ended up on whose front lawn along the way.

But that’s not how it played out.

I was slow to the evacuation party, happily looking forward to the excitement, unaware of the news corps’ omnipresent phalanx of fear mongerers doing their best to get under our skin. Then I started getting texts from friends and thought perhaps there was more to this storm than a pajama party in a school basement. After plenty of corroborating emails and mandatory evacuation pleas from local law enforcement, it was clear that leaving the beach was the best course of action, if for no other reason than to get our cars to higher ground. We were all sad to go; sorry to miss the drama and the heightened frenzy of Mother Natures’ operatic moment; sorry to miss the majesty of the ocean’s fervor and the wind’s dominance over everything not nailed down-- and many things that were.

The Friday before the storm was to hit was a bit of a mind game. How could such a serenely gorgeous day herald such mighty devastation only 36 hours later? Back home up north, I finally tuned into the news in short bursts when my son wasn’t in the room. Showboating newscasters one-upped each other all along the Eastern Seaboard as the storm’s graphics and logo smash-cut across the screen with import and flair. They were predictably redundant-- stating the obvious-- and I turned off the TV, choosing instead to talk to neighbors and text my friends for the salient bits. Mostly, my son and I listened to music and readied the house, pausing from storing the patio furniture in the garage every so often to dance, turning the music up loud and expending some nervous energy in one of the best ways I know how.

I pulled up the basement rugs and piled all the toys onto the ping-pong table-- even though we’ve never had flooding-- just in case. I brought in all the contents of the screened-in porch and piled all the furniture in the corner—just in case. Then I scrubbed the tub and filled it with water, and set out the batteries, candles, matches and gardening gloves—just in case. I’d filled up my car with gas and gone to the super market, even though, like most American’s, I probably have enough food in my cupboard to survive for three months. And I bought a case of water—just in case.

It was curious to be thrown from a casual summer schedule of certainties—one lined up after the other like dominoes on end—into a potluck of possible outcomes. It was good for me to have to think above and below the mundane hum of predictability and use my imagination to conjure scenarios; the way science fiction writers conjure unforeseeable futures. “What ifs” dominated my problem-solving mind and I was forced to get creative as the hurricane approached. Where should I put the car? In the garage for the first time ever. Where would we sleep on the night of the storm? At a friend’s house on a street with fewer large trees. What will we eat once back at our house if the power goes out? Lots of peanut butter and canned peaches, as it turns out. And what will we do once the sun goes down? Listen to our battery-operated radio and read by candlelight. Lovely. Necessity is the mother of invention, after all, and it was satisfying having planned for contingencies that came to fruition. I feel like Ma from “Little house and the Prairie.” It’s fun camping indoors, for a while.

I hope my son will remember Hurricane Irene as fun, exciting and do-able. I hope he’ll remember the candles and eating up all the ice pops before they melted. Because life just keeps coming at us and we can only control so much; it’s good to be reminded that it’s elusive and for kids to see ho we handle uncertainties. These lessons are not always pleasant, but they keep our creative problem-solving minds nimble and remind us of what we’re capable of, who are true friends are and what matters most. Then we clean up the mess and start setting up the dominoes again. Until the next breeze comes along, and then we’re off.