Friday
Above is the big side of the tree that hit my house.
This is the small side of the tree that hit my house.
Youngest and I made our way to the library to charge devices.
All around us people are telling stories about restaurants
donating food and staying open all night with the help of generators. On the
other hand, there are plenty of people telling war stories – a horrific car
accident that killed a teen on the road next to my house, trees doing
irreparable damage to homes, people with no water.
K and Oldest are replacing fencing today. We lost five or
six panels of stockade fence in our side yard. If the view wasn’t strange
enough with trees down, we now have a full view of the busy road that runs past
our house.
None of this is tragic.
My office is still without power but in a stroke of genius,
our IT guy re-routed all our email through gmail and we can communicate.
Someone set up a facebook page too and about 75 of us are sharing stories and
information. Staffers with power and heat are offering to share amenities with
co-workers who need it. It’s been another lovely example of how my company can
often feel like a community.
It’s a little tedious at my house. Oldest (who suffers with
terrible anxiety) is tough to be around. He’s nervous about traveling but feels
a little trapped at home – and when any of us venture out we return with tales
of traffic or electrical nightmares, which only feed his fears. On the roads people seem to be pretty polite
but anyplace with power is mobbed.
It’s colder the last 24 hours, so we’ve got a fire going. We
were able to find some ice yesterday and, I think, only lost some leftovers
from before the storm to spoilage.
A neighbor (Marie-Francoise’s husband) brought us a huge
pork loin that was thawing. He is on his way to Europe for her funeral there
and didn’t want it to go to waste. K threw it on the grill and we ate it over
the kitchen sink in the dark – at 11:00 in the morning.
On one hand I feel like we are doing pretty well – on the
other hand, it can be tiresome dealing with no power, heat, light. A first-world issue, for sure - it's just getting a little old.
I cannot even describe this angle of the damage.
K has decided (thankfully) to leave the tree to a professional. It is quite large and the physics involved in felling it are tricky looking.
We have train service restored and I've heard that there may be power at my office within twenty-four hours. I'm looking forward to a return to normalcy.
Comments
I'm so glad you are safe, even if Oldest is so very stressed.
K is right to leave the treee to the professionals. One of our pediatricians tried to remove a tree from his house, and ended up killing his son when the treee fell on him. This is only an inconvenience - stay safe.
OTOH, the tree fell across the street, so other than power, we are intact.
There is, however, a silver lining. Hurdles like this make a family stronger. Plus, you don't have to deal with all the political ads on TV.
Take good care of each other and tell Oldest to center himself. When he says he doesn't understand that, tell him to figure out what that could mean. Honestly it helps relieve anxieties!
XO