Tag: Staten Island

When We Lose Our Power

Several years ago, there was an ice storm in Columbus, Ohio.  The storm itself was horrible …but what was worse was the loss of power.

It was so cold that even now I shudder, thinking about it. I wanted to stay in my house, though. I thought I’d be able to make it work. I had a fireplace…and thought it would help.

It didn’t, not nearly enough. My son, daughter and myself huddled in my king-sized bed,  dressed in layers and with hats, coats and gloves on …but it just kept getting colder and colder.  Finally, I knew we couldn’t stay there. I couldn’t afford to get us into a hotel, which many people were doing. Thank goodness I had a friend who took us …and our two cats …into their home over the Christmas holidays. My two Huskies I left in the house, and went to the house repeatedly to make sure the fireplace stayed active.

I was grateful for my friends, but I hated not having power in my house. Every day I would drive to my neighborhood as dusk settled…to see if there were signs of power, and every day – for seven days, to be exact, I would leave my neighborhood, after tending to my dogs, crying. It was depressing. When my power was restored, my whole attitude changed.

I keep thinking of my own experience as I think of the people on the Eastern seaboard who do not have power. It is getting cold. Some people are staying in houses that are uninhabitable, because they have nowhere to go. The mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, estimates that 70-80,000 people may need housing, and there really aren’t enough places to put people who have been displaced by the storm.

I can feel the depression of the people who not only are looking at stark destruction before them, and who do not have the comfort of having their power. It is getting colder, and blankets are not enough to keep people warm. I can literally feel their depression.

Whenever there is a horrible weather  tragedy, there are mental health issues that we really do not think about, but one thing that exacerbates mental strain is not having power. We take it so much for granted, having power. When we have no power, we have no light, no warmth and we feel like we have no hope.  It makes us susceptible of plunging into deep, deep depression.

I wonder how the people in Haiti and the Dominican Republic and Cuba are faring, post-Sandy? It doesn’t matter your race or ethnicity; a storm wreaks havoc on people equally. Some get more attention in the aftermath, but the mental scarring is universal, not discriminatory.

We take having power for granted. Since my ice storm experience, I find myself literally thanking God every day that I have power. I think of people who do not have power because they cannot afford to pay their bills. How do they do it, mentally?  How does that affect the way they live and interact?

As horrible as the destruction is in Staten Island and on the Jersey shore, I am sure that people will feel better once their power is restored. My niece, who lives in New York, lost her power, and once it was restored, wrote, “I turned on every light in the house, just because I could.” I understand. I am thanking God for my power this morning, because it’s cold outside, and my power enables me and my family to stay warm and to have light to see.

People who were hit by Hurricane Sandy have a lot to deal with, with boats sitting atop houses, cars on top of each other, houses completely destroyed and lying on the ground like discarded toys.

But I would bet that they would be able to handle that better if they just had their power.

Funny, the things we take for granted, the things we do not miss or realize how important they are to our very psyches…until they are gone.

A candid observation …

 

 

When The Earth Falls From Beneath Your Feet

When I was a child, I remember my mother encouraging me to get on a certain ride when we visited an amusement park. I don’t remember the name of the ride, but I remember what it looked it; people would stand in these little slots and hold onto bars on either side of them, at shoulder length. There was no strap that went across them, just these bars. The ride would begin, and, going in a circle, would go faster and faster until the floor would fall from beneath their feet.

I was horrified.  There was this …thing…going around and around at such a high rate of speed, and there was no floor for the riders to stand on! My mother explained that there was nothing to worry about; something called centrifugal force was keeping the people safe. They wouldn’t fall. “The force” had them.

I never did get on that ride, and still shudder when I see it…but it made me think about the forces which are in place in our lives which keep us from falling even when the earth falls from beneath our feet.

I have been watching the people who were affected by Hurricane Sandy. I ached, literally, as I listened to a woman who lives in Staten Island talk last night on CNN about how her life had been changed in the course of an hour. “I want to go home,” she cried, “but I can’t! There is no home. I don’t have a home!”

The earth…has fallen from beneath her feet and from beneath the feet of so many others, but there is a force which will keep her and others upright, in spite of their huge loss.

I read something by Richard Rohr that explained what it is to experience “the holy.” He talked about the “communion of saints,” and said that we are always in the company of others who have gone before us. Their spirits never leave us; our DNA came from them. They have a presence with us that keeps us. It’s the same spirit that helped keep them as they went through their “floorless” moments.

It would probably be really good if some of the survivors of Hurricane Katrina could meet with, sit and touch, the survivors of Hurricane Sandy. They are truly the only ones who know how THIS particular experience feels. They have been there. The floor fell from beneath their feet…and they were held up by a spiritual centrifugal force. They didn’t stand on their own; they were too devastated and too crushed to do that. They held onto survival bars, though, and a force kept them on their feet, though their worlds were spinning and had spun out of control.

In moments of despair and great pain, all of us need something greater than us to hold us up. It’s the same “force” that kept the Jews up during the Holocaust, the same “force” that kept African-Americans up during slavery and afterward, when angry whites undid all of the gains made during Reconstruction. It’s the same force that keeps the Haitian people up, in spite of abject poverty and ruination…with really no visible light at the end of their tunnel.

I call this force “God,” but I realize that might not be what everyone calls it. Regardless of what you call it, however, there is a spiritual centrifugal force that keeps you upright …even when the earth falls from beneath your feet.

If I might go back to that ride that my mother unsuccessfully tried to get me to try: the stupid thing finally stopped spinning so fast, and as the speed of the spin slowed, the floor came back into place.  The people were safe. All they had to do was hold on and be still while the ride spun faster and faster. I suspect that because of the power of the centrifugal force, they probably didn’t even need the bars, but they helped make the riders feel secure.

Hold on, good people, to those bars. Your world is spinning out of control. The destruction around you is mammoth and scary…the earth has fallen from beneath your feet…but there is a force that will keep you up and make you able to accept and walk in your new normal.

A candid observation.

®Candid Observation, 2012