Today’s blog, from the road
Lynn Murphy Mark
Devastation
I have a really good friend who lives in Florida with her husband and two small children. They live in an area that was hard hit by Hurricane Ian. It’s been 8 days since they lost power with no clear indication of when power will be restored. Their house is uncomfortably hot without the benefit of air conditioning. They have their washing machine tub filled with ice in order to keep milk as fresh as possible for the kids.
I asked her how she is managing. She says she cries after the kids go to bed and on her way to work. She says that’s all she’s got. When I asked if I could call her, we talked while she was making her way carefully to her office, which does have power. She had just dropped the children off at day care that also has power, so her children get some hours of a cool environment. Public schools are closed, so day care is the only option. Fortunately, this day care facility will take school age kids who have no school to go to.
She described the drive to work. It used to take her 20 minutes. Now it can be as long as 40 minutes to an hour. Picture this: the road signs are all blown over. There are trees down everywhere. Traffic lights don’t work. The authorities keep telling people to stop at every intersection since there are no signals to tell drivers when to proceed and when to stop. Of course, there are people who ignore this advice, so accidents are happening with regularity.
Her husband manages a restaurant. It looked like they were going to have power and be able to open to offer hot meals. He ordered food to accommodate what would likely be a rush. The power did not stay on. Because he could not re-open he had to waste all the perishable food that he had ordered. God only knows how much food is spoiling and headed to trash cans all over the state.
My friend said she has reasons to be grateful. Their house sustained minimal damage. They were not injured. They have access to water, although it is cold water. She can easily look around her city and see people that lost everything, so sometimes she feels guilty that her family was “spared”. Still, this does not make her situation any less dire. She was crying when we first connected and as we talked she “got a grip” and some of her absolutely wonderful sense of humor crept in to our conversation. We were laughing by the end of our talk.
She says she and her husband had a serious talk about moving away from Florida. This last hurricane was enough to bring on such a conversation. Her husband manages a restaurant that is part of a chain, so he might have options for re-locating. They decided they miss having seasons. Having lived in Florida myself I understand perfectly. Changing seasons were part of the reason that Jan and I decided to move back to St. Louis. I told my friend that one of the chain’s restaurants is less than a mile from my house.
We talked a little about moving to a blue state as the best option. We agreed that we are tired of living in red states. Then she said something that makes sense. She thinks people like us should live in red states so we can help lobby for our values. I had not thought of it this way. But that’s my friend. She is an optimistic, positive soul, devoted to public service. We need more people like her who can handle adversity and still be forward thinkers. I am honored to be her friend.