Fading Winter Light

For most of February, I've been enjoying the light in the sky.  From the glorious morning sunrises I watch from the kitchen window as I sip my first cup of coffee to the evening sunsets, the light absorbs and cheers me.  That the daylight is lasting longer each day certainly contributes to my good cheer.  Last night, the sun slipped below the horizon just before 6 pm and my neighborhood was infused in a gentle light.  Even the air seemed easier, as if winter is finally losing its chilly hold.

I'm ready for warmer soil and time in the garden; for cardigan sweaters in the morning instead of mittens, tights, heavy coats, and scarves.  I long for chirping birds in the mornings and sunlight past 6 o'clock.  I want some twilight sun to warm an hour spent on the front porch.

See 'ya later, winter.

Weather PTSD

Earlier this week was the three month anniversary of Hurricane Sandy's landfall in this region.  All week, my local public radio station, WNYC, has had stories about the storm and its continuing aftermath.  Down the street from my house, a home partially destroyed in the storm is finally being repaired.  In my neighborhood, recovery is happening.

Even so, there is evidence of the storm everywhere I look, from the stumps of downed trees to the piles of brush and brambles.  There are downed trees in the woods around me.  In the evening, as I turn on the lights with ease, I sometimes pause and remember the cold and darkness of those days last fall.

Last week, it was freezing cold.  This week, temperatures kept warming.  Yesterday, it was in the 50s and this morning we had a humid day with temps near 60.  My neighbors and I, bringing recycling bins in from the curb, stopped to enjoy a chat in the evening's unusual warmth.

As we agreed that the warmth felt lovely, R, a native to New Jersey, pointed out that this kind of warmth in the winter never ends well.  He's right, of course.  Right on cue, there are wind, flood, and hazardous weather warnings for the overnight.  A powerful cold front may bring us as much as 3 inches of rain in 12 hours, rain that can't possibly be absorbed by frozen ground.  It's expected to be accompanied by gusting winds of up to 60 mph.  There's yet another risk of power outages, both because of the threatening weather and because many of us are using power lines that are still awaiting permanent structural repairs from last fall's storm.   PSE&G, my amazing local utility, sent out tweets and e-mails to remind us of their emergency response measures.  I am charging my cell phone and the other electronics.  I filled my car with gas.  My emergency supplies are in order, as they always are these days.  I'm not expecting a problem, but neither am I ever inclined to take risks or take things for granted.  I am prepared.  And that is the residual effect of Hurricane Sandy, a kind of low-level vigilance that Mother Nature demands these days.

Thursday morning update: For a few hours in the middle of the night, the storm was quite windy (of the sustained 40 mph variety).  Naturally, that led to sleeplessness on my part.  But I awakened to a home with electricity, for which I was grateful.  Cable and internet are out and JT is not amused.  I am more sanguine and just glad that most of the storm is over.  This morning's winds are less fierce and the rain has mostly stopped, though winter has returned.  It was 58 degrees when I got up at 5:30 am; right now, at just after 8 am, it's 46 degrees.

Hurricane Journal

I write every day in my journal.  For some years now, my journal has been on my computer.  Some of what I write serves as fodder for my blog and the blog itself is a kind of journal.  In the midst of the hurricane and the power loss that followed, charging my MacBook was not an option.  So I had to revert to a paper journal again.  It felt all sorts of old-fashioned to be writing on paper.  It was oddly comforting to be doing something so familiar, albeit in a now-unfamiliar fashion.  All told, we were without power for eight days, some of them quite cold.   I wrote every day.  The storm happened two weeks ago tomorrow and for the next few days I will post some excerpts from my Hurricane journal.  

In the hours leading up to Hurricane Sandy's on-shore arrival, I wrote a few postings about storm anticipation.  Here is what I wrote on Sunday the 28th.  On the day of the storm, I posted two small pieces before we lost electricity.  Those can be found here and here.

 I slept pretty poorly for the nights leading up to the storm, lying in bed running through my preparation lists and hyper-aware of every unusual sound.  My storm prep was actually done as of Saturday afternoon.  Then came an extended dance mix of waiting.  More about that tomorrow.

A Darkening Sky

The wind is a now constant now, a hum that is disconcerting.  It's complemented by strong gusts that rattle the windows and the trees.  While we still have electricity, JT is curled up in his playroom, watching Star Wars and playing on his iPad.  Child of mine that he is, he's got it plugged in to keep a constant charge.  The cats are keeping watch, curled up to watch shows recorded on the DVR (though "Call the Midwife" is hardly relaxing viewing).  We are in watching and waiting mode, with flashlights at the ready and fingers crossed.

A Whole New World

We awakened to beautiful sun today, though my front sidewalk was an icy mess.

The trees in my yard fared just fine, though the same cannot be said of other trees in my neighborhood, as the sycamore across the street can testify.

I'm lucky that I didn't lose electricity, though many people in New Jersey aren't so lucky.  And I keep reminding myself that despite the cold, it's only just the end of October.  Let's hope that tomorrow night's ghost have some polarfleece on underneath those sheets.

 

WTF?

I'm not really sure what else to say about this, the first snowstorm of the year.  It's a nor'easter in October (!) and the snow is falling at a terrific pace.  It's a damp and wet snow, as the leaf and snow heavy tree branches in my neighborhood can attest.

Even the leaf-free apple and pear trees in my yard are suffering.

Old man tree is hanging in but despite the smile I sense he's not amused.

Here's hoping this isn't a sign of another heavy snow winter in my immediate future.

September 1: Some Final Thoughts on Irene

Usually, I post a picture of my clematis vine on the 1st of each month.  But the vine didn't flourish this summer, and it seems rather pointless to post a photo of a dead vine.  Plus, the hurricane's actions in my yard rather eclipses the vine.   With a nod to tradition, I'm posting a last picture of the vine and organizing some final thoughts about Hurricane Irene.

Until we lost power, I live-blogged the hurricane, while my friend T and I waited it out and JT slept.  As I re-read what I wrote, what doesn't come through is the way the storm sounded.  It would simply be easy to say that I can confirm that a hurricane is much scarier in the dark, but that doesn't really sum up how it felt.  As the rain grew stronger and the wind came up, the storm was a howler.  With the sounds of the rain and wind were the sounds of tree branches coming down, of power lines collapsing and trees falling over.  Amidst it all were the sounds of sirens.  The darkness made the sounds even more menacing: we could hear the destruction but couldn't always tell what was happening.  I didn't feel we were alone in the storm; all night long, township authorities drove the streets, on the lookout for trouble and careful to ensure our collective safety.  Even so, it was abundantly clear that Mother Nature was running this show.

JT was a trooper.  When the storm began, we tied him on the porch to pretend that he was a Weather Channel reporter. 

Before the storm really took hold, he played outside.  Once the darkness and driving rain arrived, he was happy to be indoors.  He went to sleep with little anxiety, leaving T and I to man the ship.  We watched the telly to check the weather report.  We also kept one ear on the sounds outside.  When the National Weather Service issued tornado watches, we organized our supplies should a quick run to the basement be in order. 

At 1 am, we tried to get some shut eye.  It was uneasy rest, frequently interrupted by the sounds outside (including the siren used to call the volunteer fire force; it rang endlessly).  Around 3 am, water begin to seep into my basement.  As I debated what to do (I don't have an installed sump pump and can't pump the water out until some of it has risen up), the electricity went out, thus sealing the deal on that question.  We grabbed some sleep around then, but it was the anxious kind, frequently interrupted by events outside.  Our best rest came in the early morning hours, as the storm began to wind down and the light came up.  I was so glad to be with a capable friend as the storm blew itself out.

Come the morning, there was faint sun to accompany the last of the blowing winds.  There was water in the basement, a lake in the back yard, and branches came down all over the yard and neighborhood.  At my house, we didn't get damage so much as we got a mess. 

Pesky the backyard squirrel had holed up in the dogwood tree.  I missed a photo of him all curled up, but did catch this morning yawn.  I think Pesky had a rough night.

 The same can be said of other streets in my neighborhood.  Trees fell over.

Cars were crushed.

 The town Little League field flooded and the picnic tables and a few cars floated out with the water onto a main street in town.  This street remained flooded until Monday.

We took a walk around mid-day on Sunday and though the rain had stopped, the wind still exerted itself.  This branch fell just after we walked away from the sidewalk. 

In my yard, after the first round of cleanup, the wind blew down another branch that came down like a jousting stick, puncturing a 4 inch hole in the yard. 

Another large branch from old man tree came down the next day. 

The electricity came back on Tuesday.  The basement is cleared of water and drying out.  We re-stocked the fridge yesterday.  Today, it looks like the hot water heater will be back in business.  Later in the week, I'll see how the washer and dryer fared.  Post-storm, the weather has been lovely and serene, luring me back into a kind of complacency.  But in the quiet of the evenings since the storm, if I still myself, I can still hear that roar of stormy certainty: Mother Nature runs the show, my friends, and we'd best take care of her Earth.

Live Blogging the Hurricane

3:07 am
Woke up.....heard town siren, but not a call for tornado (though there are tornadoes south of here).  Basement was dry at 1:05 but is taking on water now.  Still have electricity.  Wind and rain is steady.


1:05 am
Gonna grab some shut eye for a bit.  Back up in the early dawn hours with updates....providing we still have electricity.  Go easy on us, Miss Irene. Please.

12:43 am
And it's official: The Weather Channel just jumped the shark, interviewing teenage girls at Asbury Park....talking about previous storms. So, yeah, that was informative.


12:22 am
Just had a rather blinkety moment with the lights. As wind gusts continue it seems likely that the electricity will take a holiday.  Though so far we're hanging in.


11:47 pm
The wind has picked up and the rain is still falling hard and heavy.  Boy asleep.  Pets nervous.  Grown ups hanging tough.


9:30 pm
For the record, the tornado watches are so not adding to the fun.


8:20 pm
Basement remains dry but now the rain is coming in a steady downpour.  There's wind but not of the gale force variety......yet, I assume.  Electricity is still with us.  So we're holding steady.


6:22 pm
Rain continues to fall steadily; windy. We've begun hourly basement checks. In the meantime, we're planning supper of chicken tacos and National Treasure. That doesn't suck.


4:44 pm
Steady, heavy rain has begun to fall.   But worse than that, we've had our first casualty of the hurricane: the toilet set is cracked. Strictly speaking, it may not be hurricane damage. But that's where blame is being assigned.

Unless Tiger and Lucy step up.

Damnit, Irene. Is nothing sacred?


3:15 pm
T won round II of Clue, so that game has been retired.

Just turned on the Weather (Panic) Channel. Where exactly do they find people to stand out on the pier during a hurricane?  Unsettling.

Very light rain here.  Wind picking up.

2:22 pm
A few bits of rain (though nothing substantial....yet). Some east wind has picked up, but still quite faint.  We've no choice but to eat lunch and play Clue.

Update: T won the first round.  

11:20 am
All of outdoors secured.  Cars backed into driveway between houses, as far away from trees as possible. Rain was short-lived.  Humidity seems to be approximately 110%.  Unexpected side-effect of Irene: mosquitoes in full-on swarm attack mode.  That rates below average.

10:38 am
A light rain has begun.  We're headed outside to put away the grill (it was used for burgers last night). 

The Hatches, They are Battened

So, yeah: Hurricane.

We've stocked up on supplies.

We've cleared off the back deck so that heavy things won't be thrown through the windows.

We've encouraged Old Man Tree to stay the course.

I'm not going to say bring it on because I'm not that sassy (shocking, no?).  But our emergency supplies are organized for in-house camping and we're as prepared as we can be.  For as long as I have electricity, I'll live-blog as the storm unfolds.

See y'all on the other side.

The Chinook

In the Laura Ingalls Wilder book The Long Winter, the family knows that spring is finally coming when they hear the wind blowing from the south.  It's a warm wind that ushers in milder weather and they call it the Chinook.  When I lived on the prairie, I came to both know and appreciate that wind.  On a cold late winter day, in a few hours, a Chinook wind can bring air 20 to 30 degrees warmer.  In just one day, the chinook carries the promise of spring.

We've had a very cold and snowy winter; certainly the coldest winter I've ever experienced in New Jersey.  Unlike the Ingalls family, we haven't suffered hunger and isolation for our troubles.  Around here, the roads are quickly cleared and we're able to get the usual supplies from the local market.  But the cold is still biting and we've grown weary of the slippery conditions and the piles of glittery, icy snow that remain everywhere we look.

After a cold and icy Saturday, Sunday dawned with a watery sunshine yielding temperatures that rose into the 40s.  By the middle of the afternoon, JT and I were exchanging our fleece sweatshirts for t-shirts and sniffing the gentle air like our cats at an open window.  Yesterday felt equally mild.  It's not exactly Florida and a cold rain is falling this morning, so winter has not yet lost its icy grip on us.

But we've seen the future.  It was glorious.

Basement Bilge, round 2

We had some big rain last night. For more than a week now, my basement had been dry. Please note the use of the phrase "had been." When I heard the rain falling at 2 am, I checked things out. All was well. But by this morning, the tide had turned and I was awash in water. I came downstairs at 6:30 in the morning to discover that I would need to swap my linen skirt for shorts, a t-shirt and my water-tolerant flip flops (a festive green). It's not nearly as bad as last week, but honestly, I'm over it.

There was enough water to use my powerful 3600 gallon an hour pump for the first 30 minutes. I did that all by myself, as the labor crew was still tucked into his warm and soft bed. The pump needs to be immersed in two inches of water, so once I got the water below that level, I had to revert to the wet/dry vac. I had returned the 16.5 gallon vac to its rightful owner so that left me with my 2.5 gallon vac. As one might imagine, that is not a particularly efficient method.

Today's plan is to secure a larger wet/dry vac,for my long-term use because OBVIOUSLY this problem isn't going away soon. The rain is forecast to stop by 2 pm and the sun should be out this weekend. But, honestly, I need to be done with this particular brand of fun.

Back in Business

The sun is shining. My driveway is dry. I am once again a girl with a car. There was barely 10 gallons of water in the basement when I got home this afternoon. Friends came out of the woodwork to help me this week. So even though the funky smell in the basement remains there is some bright sunlight at the end of the tunnel.

Waterworks, Day 3

At 11:30 pm last night I woke up to a phone call: school would be cancelled for Tuesday because so many roads in the area remained closed. I must confess that I was pleased I wouldn't have to face a morning commute on an alternative route (my drive to school and my backup drive to school are flooded and remain so today). And it would give me one more day to take care of the residual trouble in my own basement. I turned off the alarm and went back to sleep.

When I went to bed last night, the basement was nearly dry, with just a few puddles left behind. As I write this afternoon, there is no water. But the tide had come up again this morning and so I was once again in the business of water removal today. Today's water wasn't nearly the nightmare that yesterday's had been. There was no water around the hot water heater, the furnace, the party fridge, or the washer and dryer. But a large puddle had re-formed at the north end of my basement; deep enough to use the submersible pump that had saved the day yesterday.

Today's work crew was me and......... my 7 year old. He was surprisingly enthusiastic about the job and I set him up to sit on the washer and hold on to the hose as it drained water into the sink. I managed the pump, ensuring that it was always under water. J.T. quickly realized that the pump was basically a water cannon and he held the hose above the sink, calling for "more ammo." At least he didn't call me a wench. When his enthusiasm for the task waned and he made mention of child labor laws in the state of New Jersey, I provided a bowl of potato chips to help him maintain his work ethic.

In less than an hour, the magic pump had the water down to a level that could be managed with the wet/dry vac. I used that to remove the rest of the water, emptying out the bilge 16.5 gallons at a time. I can see the source of the water now and I'll keep at it with the wet/dry vac every few hours.

So in the end, I have a new knowledge home repair and a more intimate sympathy for those whose lives have been effected by rising waters. And, of course, a few good stories to tell.

Less Water = More Happiness

After about 4 hours of the amazing pump, the basement is 110% improved. There is plenty of damp concrete and there are still some puddles of water but that's a low, low tide compared with this morning's gently lapping basement surf. The appliances have survived and I've even been able to wash a few loads of laundry.

A big thanks to Miss S, whose inordinate calm in the face of the basement bilge really saved the day. The picture doesn't really convey how much better the situation is, but let's just say that you can no longer set sail on the ice chest. And that is a happy thing.

High Tide in My Basement

As of 9 am this morning my basement is filled with 3-4 inches of water. EVERYWHERE. Basically, it has a tidal pattern of its very own (let's hope that we've already seen high tide). The ex brought over a 64 gallon wet/dry shop vac last night. That was helpful, though it felt a bit like bailing out the Titanic with a thimble.

Today's plan is to get a pump to move things along. Because, dude, I need to get some laundry done and that just isn't going to happen when the washer and dryer are in danger of floating off.

Update I, 11:30 am: All efforts to locate a pump have failed and so the day is to be spent getting water out of the basement with a 16.5 gallon wet/dry vac. Universe, if you're listening, I completely yield to your powers and admit that yes, life does suck. Incredibly, it would seem.

Update II, 2:10 pm: Soon after I gave in to the despair of having to clean up gallons of water with a mop and a wet/dry vac, my friend S began a phone call campaign to find a pump. A good 7 phone calls later, the Home Depot in Bridgewater answered in the affirmative. We three shot out to the car (JT was wearing his Indian costume) and 20 minutes later I was the proud owner of a pump that can move 3600 gallons of basement bilge in an hour. Score!

We came back to Sassafras House, put on some flip flops, and waded into the basement, only later determining that standing in water and plugging in electrical appliances may not be the most sensible series of decisions two otherwise intelligent women can make. Then we watched the wonder of gallons of water being sucked out of the basement.

We've taken a break for some hot tea, but the water line is down a good two inches and I feel hopeful.

Nor'easter

Written on Saturday night:

There is a big storm forecast for my corner of the world tonight. A nor'easter is expected to bring heavy rain and winds. There was a time when I would get excited about weather. When I was with Lisa, we did weather really well. We'd plan for snowstorms, we had supplies in the basement in the event of a tornado. A spring nor'easter (this is my first) would have likely caused a frenzy of activity for us, as we battened down the hatches and waited.

But there is no us anymore. And nearly 10 months into that fact, after more than nine years of being an us, I no longer know what was real and what was make believe. Did the family of three that I cherished ever really exist, or was it just a product of my hopes and imaginations? Did we really do weather well or was that just an excuse for us to pretend that we were a unit, a family?

I don't know. But I know that it's Saturday night and J.T. has a friend to sleep over. They are playing in the attic playroom and I can hear the sounds of their games and their laughter from my spot downstairs in the quiet. And that's like a metaphor for my life right now: I can see happiness all around me but I can't quite make myself a part of it.

I've charged up my cell phone and set out some flashlights in case we lose electricity, but that's about all the frenzy that I can manage. My life is good and in my head I know this. Tonight, I have work to do and a good book to read. I could watch some of the television shows that I record on the DVR, but never get around to watching. I could turn on a baseball game to fill the silence. I could call a friend and have a good laugh. I have a healthy happy boy, friends at the ready, a home that I love, a job I enjoy, two silly kittens, and many more blessings too innumerable to count. There's no reason to feel sad, to feel less than complete.

But my heart keeps reminding me that I loved her and all that she meant to me. My heart misses what I thought I had. And my heart can't seem to move on as quickly as my mind would have it. And so I wait. And not just for the nor'easter.

Top 5 Signs That it's Freakin' Cold

5. JT readily consents to wearing his winter coat and his mittens.
4. I turned on the furnace in my house.
3. Flannel toilet paper.
2. Female students' skirts actually larger than a postage stamp.
1. The window in my classroom is not open.