Hurricane Sandy hits home

Hurricane Sandy in full swing

A darkened NYC

Two months in and we were greeted with a harsh welcoming - Hurricane Sandy hit the tri-state area and left many towns devastated.  The eye zeroed in on the NJ but lower Manhattan went under water, and Staten Island, Westchester County, and the Jersey shore also suffered incredible damage.  There are many towns still without power, six days later, and parts of the shore have been wiped off the map.  Literally, Seaside Amusement Park is now in the ocean, beachfront homes that laid between the Ocean and the Bay have been washed away, and there are towns everywhere with a changed footprint.

Entrance to Battery Tunnel in NYC

NYC cabs in a parking garage - under water

Seaside Amusement Park - gone

Our town was hit hard.  We lost power Monday night, on October 29, and many residents are still without.  It was a slow storm.  It felt liked we waited around for days for Sandy to arrive.  We received word on Sunday afternoon that school would be cancelled on Monday and Tuesday.  We had already taken cover on Thursday as the stores emptied out of water, batteries, and soup.  Then came the wait.  We all sat around on Monday as the winds kicked up and the storm slowly made its way inland. We baked cookies, played with neighbors, and began to clear out the basement.

One of hundreds of trees in NJ, uprooted from the storm

Memories of last years' storms, Irene and the Halloween storm, were still present in everyone's minds.  We were not here but we heard enough stories that we felt like we lived through it.  Then Sandy came and brought us to a whole new level. Irene left everyone with flooded basements.  The Halloween storm dumped 8 inches of snow and left behind snapped trees.  But Sandy is the hurricane that uprooted our landscape. Hundreds of trees fell and with it went telephone poles, wires, roofs, and our picturesque small town.

A Staten Island home protesting the marathon

The aftermath.  This is the hard part.  We can barely get back on our feet.  There was a lot of controversy over the NYC marathon.  Originally Mayor Bloomberg said we should go ahead with it; it will jump start the economy (which was the real motivator), and it will show we have resilience.  But then we started seeing areas in NYC which were hard hit, like Staten Island where there is no power and the water is contaminated.  The worst part is nobody even knew about it until four days after the storm.  We're just not there yet.  Today was supposed to be the Marathon.  They cancelled it 48 hours ago.  People are still getting power back as evidence of Facebook.  New posts pop up every hour; "Hooray, we are back in business."

Now for the recovery.  The utility trucks have been out around the clocks working to restore power to those without - which is just about everyone.  Our parents, on both sides of the family, are still without power which worries us.  Plus, in the neighboring rural town, Harding, we heard they will not get power back until Thanksgiving nor will the kids go back to school.  That's crazy.

The gas lines are 3-4 hours long.  It has grown so out of control they closed stations and brought in the police to manage tempers - NY/NJ tempers which can become unruly on a good day.  Beginning yesterday, you can only fill up your tank on the even/odd day corresponding to your license plate.

The grocery stores still remain vacant.  The inner isles are somewhat filled with canned and boxed goods.  However, the outer isles, the ones they say you should shop in if you want to stay healthy, are sparse.  Dairy, produce, and meats are slow to be restocked as they had to throw away everything when the power went out.  Forget picture perfect health, we're just looking for a few bananas to eat.

However, every day progress is being made.  More friends are getting their power back.  Traffic lights are being restored.  Stores are posting signs, "We're Open".  We had garbage pick-up three times since the storm ended, for those that missed the first and second pick-up.  There are trees cut up everywhere - on the sides of roads, on lawns, on just about everyone's property.  Halloween, which was cancelled for the second year in a row, was held yesterday on Nov. 3.  Kids dressed in costume and trick or treated at the houses that offered candy, those that were with restored power and had not been damaged by the hurricane.

Slowly but surly life is getting back to normal.  As we look ahead, everyone is making plans.  New York City officials are looking at the city's infrastructure and brainstorming new ideas.  Home owners are scrambling to buy generators.  Everyone is taking a hard look at their emergency plan and revamping it.  We all thought we were prepared but the bottom line is the weather patterns have changed.  Hurricane Sandy was not an anomaly.  The prediction is it will happen again.  The question is will we be prepared, and how will we tackle global warming in the future?  

Don't forget to vote on Tuesday ~ the election and our future depends on it.