Hurricane season is a unique time of year. For anyone who has living in the hurricane regions, especially if they have weathered a storm, this time of year generates a real shift. And while we all watch the weather, we are slow to get motivated or enthusiastic about tropical storms. Like violence on the street to a native New Yorker or homelessness to Washingtonians, sub-hurricane level storm systems just don’t rank. Almost everyone I know can read the NOAA website data like a professional meteorologist. We look at the millibars and the other high and low pressure systems. We can predict the path of a storm. No one I know was really impressed with Tropical Storm Fay. There are summer afternoon thunderheads with my force and fear than this storm. If she dumps 6 or 8 or 10 inches of rain on us….good. The aquifer needs it. In fact, it will make the tubing over Labor day weekend awesome.
Hurricanes are different that almost every other weather event. Tornadoes can be more destructive, but are short lived. They cut through with surgical precision. Earthquakes are unpredictable, sudden and dry. Both are violent but over quickly. Hurricanes are neither slow moving or unpredictable. You know they are coming. Days ahead of time, you know. And you watch. And you wait. I went through Hurricane Andrew. I cannot believe it has been 16 years. I know because my nephew is a hurricane baby. He just turned 15. What else are you to do living in a travel trailer without TV? The baby boom after Hurricane Andrew was incredible. Our home was spared, but out old neighborhood and our families were devastated. It is how we all ended up in Gainesville. High ground. One hundred miles from each coast. Out of the state and into Georgia in 40 minutes.
So, school got canceled today because of Fay. Shameful. Like Florida needs “snow days”. So….we do laundry. We play Wii. We make cookies and we hang out.