GOODBYE 2012

I miss writing.  I miss you guys too...

So, since I last wrote, things have kinda sucked.  Unless you were living under a rock, you know that Hurricane Sandy hit my home state pretty hard.  What you probably don't know is that it hit my home pretty hard too...

We live on a lot with a lot of trees.  We had been listening to them come down in the backyard (nowhere near the house) half the afternoon, before the storm even got bad.  Around 6:45 we heard a weird noise outside.  Hubby ran outside with a flashlight trying to investigate.  It was nothing more than a branch that scraped along the side of the house without doing any noticeable damage.

He came back in, sat down and we resumed playing boardgames with our son. No less than 5 minutes later, we heard a sickening CRASH, BANG, BOOM!  I screamed.  Andrew cried. Hubby got up and...whatever he saw, he came back, turned Andrew around and said, "Pack a bag. You're going to your mother's."

As I walked upstairs, I saw that my living room wall had been split open.  Hands shaking uncontrollably, I hastily packed a bag, called my mother, saying no more than, "We're coming over" and packed Andrew in the car.  It was the height of the storm.  Trees and branches were down everywhere.  Wind was gusting so badly, it was blowing my car from one side of the street to the other. 

Andrew, ever the backseat driver, told me, "Don't worry, Mommy! My eyes are EVERYWHERE! I'm watching for danger."  The three minute ride to my parents' was probably the most terrifying 15 minutes of my life. 

We got inside and I couldn't even tell my parents what had happened.  I immediately ran upstairs to my room and couldn't keep the tears from falling.  I saw Andrew coming up the stairs, flashlight in hand even though the lights were still on, and heard him going into every room.  He came into my room, patted my hand and reported, "All the rooms are safe, Mommy.  We okay."  It probably made me feel even worse that my kid was comforting me instead of me comforting him.

It took another hour before Hubby gave up waiting for the police or firemen to come to make sure there wasn't a ruptured gas line.  My parents lost their power not more than 15 minutes later... They wouldn't regain it for 13 days. 

No power. No heat.  It was fucking cold!  We actually started going to movies (a lot!) because they were lit.  No one in the area had power back, so people were literally huddled around power outlets in the mall.  I heard people offering to pay Cinnabon $20 to let them charge their cell phones in the back.  One woman camped out in the center of the mall and brought out a power strip, proceeding to plug in her laptop, cell phone, iPad, iPod and probably every other electronic device in her home.

When we checked out our place, it really defied description.  There were downed trees everywhere.  Our front yard was literally covered with them.  Three trees had come through our house.  They came through our roof, collapsing the roof into the attic, pushing both through our bedroom ceiling.  It all came down on our bed.  On MY side of the bed, specifically.  I couldn't help but think that if the threes had come down either a couple hours earlier or a couple hours later, I would have been in that bed.  Andrew would have been in our bed.  *That* thought still is enough to bring tears to my eyes...

Another tree snapped in half when it hit the roof and swung through my living room wall.  As they were ripping that tree out of my house, part of the tree went through my bedroom window.  When the people came to secure the roof, they tossed the crushed dormer window off the side of the house, right onto my air conditioner.  The tree landed directly onto my satellite dish, which for a long time resided on my front lawn in a manged heap. 

So, two weeks at my parents, no heat or electricity.  Hubby's car died.  My (parked) car got sideswiped.  We FINALLY got a hotel room, spending week 3 post-storm in a VERY sketchy hotel.  It broke my heart as Andrew would ask where he was going to sleep, where his stuff was.  My dad was insane enough to stage a rescue mission into my bedroom before we knew if it was secure to get Andrew's favorite stuffed bear off my bed.  2 weeks without power at work either, which drove me damn near insane without any semblance of routine.

We've been in an apartment ever since.  MAYBE on Wednesday they'll start framing work finally.  But it'll be 3-4 months construction, rebuilding a quarter of my house before we can go home. 

This has been pretty tough to take.  People have been great, offering their help and support, places to stay, stuff for Andrew.  One of my students from when I was a TA in law school sent me a message on Facebook, telling me that there were so many people who would help me, if I let them.  She wasn't one of the people I was closest to, but she knew me well enough to know I struggled - greatly - with letting anyone help me and my family, even though we needed it.  One of my sorority sisters emailed every day just to distract me with some silly story - something her kid did, some crazy person she encountered on the way to work, anything really - just to offer me a few seconds of distraction to make me think of anything else.  A high school friend I haven't spoken to in almost 20 years hooked me up with a tree guy who was willing to come out to our house immediately, something we desperately needed so that we could get the trees out of the house and secure the place...

I've blown deadlines.  I've managed to not put out a single issue of the publication I edit.  I've neglected cases. 

Somehow, along the way, all this supposedly will have made me stronger because - hey - it didn't kill me.  And whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right?

So, fuck you 2012.  I can't wait for you to be over!

I'm hoping for far better things in the new year!