Good riddance and farewell Irma, especially in the
destructive wake of Harvey.
Now as I write this Jose is threatening our boat in
Connecticut with Maria on its heels likely to impact the same islands devastated
by Irma (adding Puerto Rico as a direct Category 4 hit).
We’ll pay for a “Wall” to alienate good neighbors such as
Mexico but refuse to take global warming seriously. Why not treat THAT as an urgent matter,
especially for future generations? No,
global warming didn’t “cause” Harvey or Irma, but the severity of storms will
only increase in the future without shrinking the carbon footprint of our seriously
overpopulated planet. There is more than
three times the number of people on this planet than when I was born! Malthus was right about the geometric growth
of population, but food shortage will not be the only offset. There are solutions, if only we had the
wisdom to listen to our scientists. But
I digress. Back to the storm itself.
The day before the hurricane would begin to affect
Florida we were due to fly out of the White Plains airport via Jet Blue,
returning to home after spending a month on our boat in Connecticut. Man makes plans and fate laughs.
As the storm was ramping up, with more and more dire
warnings of a potentially Category 5 storm threatening Florida, we, too, became
obsessed with the Weather Channel, watching every twist and turn of the
spaghetti models. Ka-ching, ka-ching for
the Weather Channel, with, ultimately, their reporters waist-deep in water,
leaning into the wind with their microphones for the enjoyment of their
audience. This is what reporting has
become in the age of reality TV.
Early on it seemed to have a path that Floyd followed in
1999 and Mathew last year. If so, it
would track close off shore up the east coast of Florida and we thought to
ourselves best be home before as that Saturday flight would be cancelled and
flights would be more difficult to obtain later. I had a monthly car rental from Avis to
return to the White Plains airport, one of those special monthly deals for which
they wanted to charge me a fortune on a per diem basis if I kept it more than
the appointed time. Funny the things you
consider in the light of an impending weather event that could change your
life. Avis is truly Ka-ching oriented
with subpar customer service and dirty automobiles. Never again, Avis.
So on the day after we changed our reservations to return
on Thursday, the models shifted to a direct track over the east coast of
Florida. Looking at the maps it appeared
to have a bulls-eye on our house! Did we
want to be in the house during a Category 4 or 5 storm? If we were younger, perhaps I would have
said, bring it on. Not so anymore. This is especially the case given the images
of Houston’s bout with Hurricane Harvey.
Such devastation and heartbreaking scenes.
As we were making a donation to the Red Cross for Harvey,
we contacted Jet Blue again (knowing it was hurricane season, I had presciently
bought their Jet Blue Flex tickets, which enabled me to change without
penalty). As we were to fly out of a small
airport (HPN) to PBI, there were a limited number of seats available for their
Tues., Weds. or Thurs. flights. I
figured the hurricane would be gone by Tues, but thinking of the logistics of
rearranging planes and flight crews, selected Weds. which, as it turned out,
was the first day they did indeed resume flights to PBI. Just dumb luck.
Now we just had to wait it out on our boat, hoping still
the storm would pass out to sea, not wishing it on the west coast of Florida,
but with every update, that’s where it seemed to be moving. When we decided to move to Florida 18 years
ago, we of course knew of the hurricane dangers (but most of the damage I
witnessed during my life was from storms that visited Connecticut or Long
Island, such as Carol, Gloria, and Sandy).
We had been in our house in Florida for Hurricanes Jean and Wilma, the
latter being the worse although damage was limited.
Most of the really life threatening effects of hurricanes
is from storm surge and not wind, and yet we live on the water. But the water has never gone over our
seawall. We purposely bought on the east
coast of Florida because the continental shelf drops off into deep water near
the shore and storm surge is less of a threat than on the west coast as the
Gulf of Mexico is shallow.
Several years ago, with our mortgage paid off, we had the
option of dropping the otherwise mandatory portion of our insurance covering
windstorm damage from a hurricane. By
then, there was only one state sponsored insurance company that would cover
homes near the water, Citizens, and their rates became usurious, with enormous deductibles. We could pay all those premiums for years and
years and probably not need it so instead we set aside those premiums for
retrofitting our home for “the really big one. “
Irma seemed to be it.
The first significant investment after banking those premiums was a new
roof using top of the line underlayment in combination with the 3M Polyset
roofing tile attachment system which is guaranteed for 20 years. Roofs which were peeled off during Hurricane
Charlie using conventional nails, screws, and mortar (as was our previous roof),
were unscathed using the 3M system, so we went for the best. At the same time we replaced the east facing
corrugated steel window panels with clear Lexan panels so there could be some
light during a hurricane if we should be in the house (we were in the complete
dark during Wilma).
Next year we replaced all north and south facing windows
with heavy duty hurricane impact windows and installed a generator to run the
essentials (not a whole house gen as we rarely lose power and not for a long
time). This has its own circuit breaker
box and I just plug in a 30 amp line, exactly the same kind as we use on the
boat in Connecticut.
Then the next year, the big expense, installing electric
roll down shutters across the length of our water-facing porch and therefore
not needing those heavy panels on the four sliding glass doors that open to the
porch. That also tied down the roof to
the cement foundation with the supports for the roll downs.
Last year we completed the retrofit by replacing the two sets
of French double doors that open out to our pool patio with the heaviest impact
doors made. Each of the four doors must
weigh hundreds of pounds each. It took
four men to carry one and all day to install.
At the same time I fabricated and had installed a brace
for our garage door, although the door itself is hurricane rated. The brace was to be used only for the most
extreme storm as it is tied into the cement floor with anchors and attaches to
the rafters of the attic which provides additional strength to both the roof
and garage door. Given the dire
forecasts, we asked our house minder to put up that brace.
And, so, we waited out the storm, fairly confident about
our house, but we worried about our community and friends who had sheltered in
place.
Meanwhile, life goes on. I had to return that monthly rental car to
Avis, and picked up a less expensive weekly rental, which by the time we were
half way back to the boat from the airport I finally noticed a light flashing
“check tire pressure.” Cars have gone
electronic and usually this means the pressure is a little off so I made a
mental note to get air at a filling station.
By the time we got back to the marina, I looked at the tires. All seemed to be fully inflated, until we saw
the mother of all nails in the right rear.
It was situated in such a way that it looked like it was there for a
long time, a perfect plug, but did I want to take a chance it would hold? No. So
I called Avis and tried to do a local swap at one of their nearby offices, but no,
I had to drive all the way back to the airport.
“Ka-ching!” Avis cried out again.
So all the way back to the airport and then had to deal
with a surly, clearly unmotivated check in person in the lot before having to
go back to the desk.
They gave me
another car which was low on windshield fluid and was just unclean, but by that
time I was in the lot, and needed the car for only a few days, so we drove back
to the marina, not happy campers.
I had had it with driving, the anxiety of the encroaching
hurricane, the uncertainty of whether it would be a direct hit, and that night
we were to celebrate our son’s birthday with he and his fiancée, Tracie. They
kindly offered to drive us to the restaurant which was not exactly around the
corner, in Cannondale, CT, a special place called “The Schoolhouse” – actually
an old school house. But the best part
is Jonathan drove and used all the back roads of verdant Connecticut, winding
hills up and down, past places I hadn’t seen in years and years, arriving at
the restaurant as if there was not a care in the world. We were all together, Jon, Tracie, Ann, and
myself, as the requisite selfie shows.
The menu was even printed just for us, welcoming the
“Hales” which is our restaurant reservation name, much easier to give the name
“Hale” than my real surname.
The Schoolhouse is a “farm to table” restaurant and a
relaxing, enjoyable experience. What a
break from all the anxiety.
Back to the boat for the next few days, to prepare for
our trip home, wondering whether the storm will leave the community intact. With every hour, its track moved further and
further west, seemingly to put the west coast of Florida in the cross hairs of
a potential massive tidal surge, which would have been the worst of all
possible outcomes.
Meanwhile, knowing there was nothing more I could do for
our own house, I tried to read Richard Russo’s short story / novella
collection, Trajectory. Hard to give it the attention it so richly
deserves, while tracking a storm on my phone on and off, and wondering whether
there would be a flight on Weds. as we had scheduled. Russo, along with Anne Tyler, are our best
mature storytellers, sharing so much in common, our very own modern day Jane Austens,
their idiosyncratic characters crying out for love, fearing their social
awkwardness, dealing with money and health problems, but mostly with their
fractured relationships.
In fact the story “Voice,” concerns a retired Jane Austen
scholar, Nate, who is inveigled by his older brother, Julian, to go on a group
tour to Italy.
Their relationship reverts
to one of their childhood, meanwhile competing for the same woman.
In general, the collection is infused with
Russo’s gift of humor.
Perhaps the
funniest novel I ever read is his
Straight
Man.
The latter is laugh out loud,
but one can get a sense of his more subtle gift of humor and characterization from
this paragraph from “Voice.”
A modern
day Jane Austen would be proud of him:
At any rate, as the
two women approach, weaving through the crowd, Nate knows he's on his own. The
plain one arrives first, thrusting her hand out, much as a man would, and
announcing that her name is Evelyn, or, if he prefers, Eve. Nate, wondering why
on earth he should have a preference, takes the proffered and pretends delight
to be met. Eve's hair is cut sensibly short for a woman her age – early 60s,
Nate figures, though he's never been much good I guessing women's ages – and
she's wearing something like a tracksuit, except nicer and maybe even expensive.
The general impression she conveys is of a woman who once upon a time cared
about how much she presented herself to men but woke up one morning, said fuck
it and was immediately happier. She is also, Nate fears, one of those women who
is confident she knows what's in the best interest of others. Seeing someone
who obviously prefers to be left alone, she's all the more determined to
include him in whatever awful group activities she's contemplating. The word
she probably uses to describe whatever she has in mind is fun. It won't
be, of that Nate's certain.
Russo deals with my own concern with Group travel: Nate
studies the daily travel schedule, trying to square it with the people he
met. A few appear fit enough, but others
strike him as medical emergencies waiting to happen. Both humpbacked Bernard
and the orange-haired, chain-smoking women who stop to catch her breath…are
genuine heart-attack candidates. Then there’s the extremely elderly couple who,
when at rest, lean into each other should to shoulder, forming the letter A; if
either were to move quickly, a broken hip would be the likely result for the
other.
Russo’s humor camouflages the flip side, aging, illness, death
and even his own writing skills. In the
story “Intervention” Ray, a middle aged real estate agent is facing a crisis,
having a cancerous tumor. He thinks
about his father’s death: But he must also have been proud of his
father, or why would he be emulating him now it hadn't been a conscious
decision – I'll do this the way my father did it – when he was informed
about his own tumor. He simply concluded, as his father must've done, that he
wasn't special, that there was no reason such a thing shouldn't happen to him.
Like his father, he hadn't protested that he was too young, or that he had been
cheated, or that life is unfair, or that he deserved an exemption.
In “Milton and Marcus,” Ryan, a writer in desperate need
of a job is invited to try screen writing again. He has his doubts about rejoining the
Hollywood game and even more so about his skills:
Over the years we
kind of stayed in touch, and when I had a new book out, Wendy always called to
congratulate me. I think he must've known that my work had lost a good deal of
its vitality by then. Each book sold fewer copies than the one before, and
while the critics remained mostly respectful many reviews seem to agree that my
earlier works had felt far more urgent than the later ones. The sad truth is
that some writers have less fuel in the tank then others, and when the vehicle
begins to shudder, you do well to pull over to the side of the road and look
for alternative transportation which is what I did.
But if I had to pick but one phrase as central to this
collection, it is:
The thing about
confidences – the unsolicited opening of the heart – is that they invite
reciprocity, even when it’s not a good idea….Russo offers “the unsolicited
opening of the heart” in Trajectory.
And so with the completion of the novel came the passing
of Irma, the devastation on the west coast of Florida, but thankfully less than
they thought it would be, although the Florida Keys was not so spared. So, upon
our scheduled return to our home, we wondered what we would find. Except for some minor landscaping damage, one
could hardly tell our home had been hit by the storm. We were among the lucky ones.
But we also returned to the sad news that Ann’s cousin
Saul had died. He had had a massive
stroke two weeks before the storm, and his three “kids” were determined to form
a vigil by his bedside with his wife of 55 years, Lynda. They moved him to hospice when he was declared
brain dead. And there they sat through
the storm, Saul fighting death for days and days without food or water. The family was finally able to hold his
funeral in Boca which naturally we attended.
This is a very close family, children and grandchildren, and they stood
with their mother at the Mausoleum where the service was held and then the
interment.
The Mausoleum itself is on two floors with multiple crypt
levels for bodies. Ann and I have never
been to one. It is a massive marble structure
which we have never seen, as well as the procession, the casket being raised on
an elevated platform after being wrapped in a clear plastic tarp, and then
inserted in a cubicle for two, an instrument being used to push the casket all
the way in the back of the cubicle, leaving room for his wife when she
ultimately passes. We all sadly watched
this.
It is otherworldly and I could not help but think of
homeless victims of Harvey and Irma, or people who lost their lives, who could
have been protected in shelters such as this fortress. And believe me; this building will outlast
any structure in Florida. It is not my
place to pass judgment on the need for placing our remains in such edifices. If it gives families comfort, so be it, but
when one thinks of the resources being used to protect the dead while the
living need so much, it gives me pause. For us there will be cremation and the
scattering of our ashes to the rising waters.
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| Shorefront Park, Norwalk CT |
