22 - Florence / STORMS

Here in South Carolina this week, there has been ONE THING on everyone’s mind:  Hurricane Florence. 

We watch the television or online constantly for the latest updates.  Sites with webcams that are located at the beach become increasingly popular.  My favorite is in Murrels Inlet at the Dead Dog Saloon.  People flock to the stores for bottled water, bread, milk, and other supplies to have on hand “just in case.”  The location of the “Cone of Uncertainty” becomes a topic of discussion, as do the spaghetti models of possible tracks of the storm. 

 

 People share memories of the chaos caused by Hurricane Hugo in 1989, and talk about how long they were without power, how badly the beaches were damaged, how it affected their lives.

I live on a lake that is prone to flooding with a heavy rainfall, and if upstream gets a lot of rain, it’s a sure bet that the following week that runoff will be in my back yard. I see that the "Powers That Run The Lake" have dropped our lake levels drastically in advance of this storm, and I appreciate their efforts.

We have spent the past few days getting prepared for possible power outages and flooding.  The generator is ready; we have fuel for it.  We have plenty of food and water, candles and flashlights.  Books and craft supplies are at the ready as well. 

We brought in our yard furniture, took down the flags, pulled the plants under the deck for safe-keeping.  In the basement, our appliances have always been up on concrete blocks.  We’ve rolled up the rugs, taken things off the bottom shelves and floor and stacked them on the tables.  We have some large wood blocks staged to put under the furniture  --  all of these things done just in case it looks like water may come into the basement.  

I guess we are as prepared as we can be.

At this point, we are just watching and waiting for the storm to hit. 

Being new to having Myasthenia Gravis, I am constantly learning about different things that may affect how I feel.  I know that extreme heat, stress, anxiety, and lack of sleep can make me feel really bad.  The past couple of days, I’ve really felt draggy, like my arms and legs are encased in concrete, and my chest feels weighted.  I just figured I had overdone it some.  (Imagine that!)  

I’m on a couple of online MG support groups, and someone posted that they noticed the same feelings when the barometric pressure changed, and the approaching storm could really affect us.  Ahh…. That’s a new one.  I’d always connected my sinus headaches to the barometer levels, so perhaps that’s the culprit. 

Storms in life come in many forms:  hurricanes, floods, illness, financial ruin, personal problems.  They can be life-altering and devastating.  We think we are in control of things, that we have independence, and power to take care of ourselves.  But sometimes a storm takes out that power.  It is then that we realize that we need each other.  We are all inter-connected, we are each a part of a living organism called humanity.  Our vulnerability in times of need helps us to realize this concept.  The silver lining in this is a deeper gratitude for the help we receive, and a more generous ability to share with others when they are in need.     

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Untethered Time Travel:  STORMS

It is late September, 1989. 

I am 33 years old. 

A storm named Hugo is churning in the Atlantic, aimed for the South Carolina coast.  We cluster around the television, watching, holding our breath, hoping Garden City Beach will be spared. 

I grew up hearing about the storm in 1954, Hurricane Hazel.  My grandfather Ashe (we called him Pop)  and great-uncle Hoyle had just built houses at Garden City.  After the storm passed, Pop’s place had vanished.  

Family legend tells that a portion of Uncle Hoyle’s house was discovered a couple of miles down the beach.  They floated it back up to his lot.  While the rest of the house had been destroyed, the teacups in the cabinets of that one room were still hanging from little hooks, unscathed.

Back to 1989 -- Hugo made landfall in the night.  We lived a couple hundred miles inland, though, and expected most of the damage would be at the coast.  However, our winds picked up at home also.  As the night progressed, the winds howled louder, the power went off, and our house made groans and creaks we’d never heard before.  In the wee hours of the morning, Amanda (9) and Melody (6) came running into our room and hopped in bed with John and me.  Drew was still a baby; I got him out of his crib and brought him in with us too.  The five of us huddled together in the bed, in the dark, listening to the wind and the rain.

The next morning showed a changed scene.  The storm was gone, leaving a path of destruction that stretched hundreds of miles.  Where we lived and in the  surrounding area, there were trees down, splintered like piles of toothpicks.  Homes damaged.  Businesses, chicken houses and farm buildings – livelihoods—destroyed. Debris littered yards and fields.  The power was off for several days; school was cancelled a week.  

 

At Garden City Beach, damages were massive.  Pop’s beach house was two-story.  The lower floor was washed out.  The top floor rested on a few piles of bricks left.  He eventually hired a crane that lifted that top floor up.  They rebuilt the bottom floor and placed the upstairs back in place.  My parents’ house suffered some water damage in the lower part, but fortunately no structural issues.  They were lucky:  the house across the street was washed off of its foundation and deposited in my folks’ front yard, less than 12” from the corner of their house.  You could not walk between the two; if it had come much closer, it would have knocked some of the supports out from under my parents’ house. 

In the days following, the news showed lots of items about the damages from the storm and the problems caused by power outages.  

But they also showed a lot of stories about neighbors coming together to help each other, and becoming friends in the process.  

Something good developed as a result of something tragic.  

A storm in life, bringing people together to lift one another up to a higher level

We are all seeking shelter from the storms.