November 7, 2012

Crying on a breeze, the pain is calling.....Oh Sandy.




You may have all heard: there was once an old woman who lived in a shoe then she decided to blow the whole East Coast like a discounted whore.  Her name is Sandy and she is filthy little thing.

On the night of October 28, the storm had arrived.  I couldn't grasp the concept of “the eye of the storm” that the weather forecasters spoke of because the only “eye” I could relate to is “the eye of the tiger.”  It baffled me as to how a storm could travel up the East Coast, do damage and move onto another town. It sounded to me that Sandy just tooted and booted. The winds grew stronger and just like contractions, the more powerful and sooner the intervals meant we were closer to delivery.  I closed my curtains in fear of a lightning bolt striking through my window to aim for the metal in my eyeglasses and I would be struck right between my eyebrows.  Then, I would be paralyzed and left to die before my popcorn finished popping and my roommates found me.  My chances for freak accidents were greater during a storm and statistics show: so was everyone else’s.  Heavy rained poured, strong winds blew, lights began to flicker and within two hours the power went out.  It was happening- colonial life began.   

Candles were the light of my life for the next six days and sponge baths became a familiar routine.  Bathing in candle light would have been a romantic scene if I hadn't of had rock hard nipples that could etch glass and shivering like a wet Chihuahua.  With every cold lather I brushed over my body, all I thought was how fortunate I am to not have grown up in a power-less and shower-less era.  Viva la hot showers!  Cold baths became my enemy and like other New Yorkers we pushed our hygienic limits just enough until we had to succumb to yet another frigid wash.  Dirty hair was a predicted trend for the week and I did not see one unfashionable person in sight. 

Every day I walked thirty blocks uptown in search of heat and electricity; I was a metropolitan refugee.  The value of a power outlet had increased overnight and at the sight of an available outlet, refugees scrambled like piranhas to plug their cell phones causing an outright duel in the middle of Starbucks.  The anxiety of losing power to one’s cellphone felt as though you were losing your leash to the rest of the world and suddenly you were scared, cold and alone.  I watched my battery diminish from 40% to 20% to 10% to dead.  As soon as my screen went blank, the world became a little more dangerous, I forgot the directions to get home and I needed a bowl of chicken noodle soup more than ever.  I would hurry home before sunset to avoid descending down into the abyss of darkness where figures of the unknown existed.  Most of the time they were innocent people walking their dogs but in my imagination I was surrounded by third degree murderers and face eating zombies waiting to attack their next victim.

On the sixth day, ConEd said, “Let there be light!” I woke up Saturday morning to electricity, heat and hot water.  I immediately took a HOT, HOT, HOT shower until my fingers turned pruney and I simulated a fever.  Then, I turned on my phone, turned on the TV, turned on my computer and microwaved any object in sight…just because I could.