Waiting on Irene

Now it's a waiting game. Preparations are done with: patio and yard cleared of potential flying hazards, candles, water, and other supplies are stocked and within hours we'll be experiencing Irene up close and personal. It's been raining all day, pretty much, and now at 7:30 it's a little darker than it normally would be. There are no cars on the street, no sounds of people walking by. Everything's eerily quiet, the proverbial quiet before the storm.

They say the winds will start to reach us within a few hours, in the dead of night, and by the time we wake up, Irene will be at our doorstep here on Long Island and New York City. For the past two days the hype has been built up to the extreme, with 24/7 coverage that quite simply throws too much fear in the hearts of those in the path of the monstrous storm, which covers an area of over 500 miles wide.

Of course, all hurricanes are serious business, and everyone should know the risks involved in sitting one out, but to me the hype is always a bit too much. For the past two days supermarkets and box stores have been raided of all of their water and batteries. People have taped their windows and filled their bathtubs (for what I'm not really sure) and evacuations just south of me have left people scared to death of what's to come. For whatever its worth, I hope everyone's preparations are for the better.

The nice part about the whole mass hysteria at the stores has been the compassion and niceties that seem to only come out during a crisis. I went out today to buy a couple of last minute things just in case the stores will be closed for a few days due to power outages: cat food, bread, a quart of milk, and a couple of other things. Every interaction I had with a stranger ended with a "be safe" or a "good luck." It was nice to realize that the human spirit still exists!

So here we are, waiting patiently for Irene's arrival. Soon the winds outside will be howling and the rain will be coming down in sheets. Power will be cut out, most certainly, but hopefully not during the middle of the night. The forces outside my window will be scary enough without losing any sort of connection to the outside world that electricity affords us, especially that I live alone in a big house. So now we wait. Stay tuned for whatever comes next. Hopefully I'll have the power to continue telling my story...