Watching Gustav

As I was getting ready for work this morning, the weatherperson on Channel 11 said “we’re watching Gustav.” The hurricane season is heating up, and every week or two we’re watching some tropical storm or other, hoping it will just fizzle out before it gets to us. We’ve been lucky since the memorable season of 2005, when Katrina and its aftereffects messed up New Orleans and sent Houston 250,000 new citizens, and her sister Rita a few weeks later sent our area into a tizzy. Will we be lucky this season? We’re watching Gustav, just as we watched Eduard a couple of weeks ago. I still have my hurricane supplies of batteries and bottled water, canned tuna and beans, from that non-event.

There was a time when I loved hurricane season. My dad was in the Navy, and hurricanes were just part of our lives, from Key West to Charleston to Norfolk.  My siblings and I always thought it was a fine adventure, a time when Mother cooked up most of the food in the refrigerator, packed the freezer with ice, and got out the kerosene lamps.  Our  most exciting  storm  knocked a tree into our roof.  My grandparents were visiting, and I was sure they  were  having a great adventure too.  Our grownups must have been  excellent at hiding their fears, because the kids were never scared.

My dad retired and we moved to hurricane-less Dallas.  I grew up, went to college in high and dry Lubbock, and married. My husband was in the Army, and my first son was born at Ft. Eustis, near the Chesapeake Bay, during Hurricane Christine.  I watched it from my hospital window, not afraid, but not as excited as I was in my youthful innocence.  Damage was done, and people’s lives were disrupted.

I’ve been in Houston since 1974, and weathered many hurricanes and tropical storms. The worst damage we’ve had came from a mere tropical storm, Allison.  She hung around and dumped vast quantities of rain over the city.  The medical center was hit hard, and valuable lessons were learned.  One big one – don’t put your emergency generators in the basement!

The freeways were under water, 18-wheelers floating like toys in a bathtub.  Wasn’t that a storm!  Then came Katrina. Houstonians watched our neighbors suffer, and rallied to their aid, filling the Astrodome – which was nice and dry, cool, and clean, but still not home – and other shelters, filling warehouses with clothes and supplies.  Lessons were learned then too – if you’re in a danger zone, get out if you can.  Also, you can’t depend on your government to help you … We were barely done with Katrina when Rita reared her ugly and dangerous head.  She was a monster, quickly becoming a category 5, and heading straight for the Texas coast, vulnerable Galveston Island, and Houston, 50 miles inland.  What we didn’t learn from the other storms is – don’t panic, use some common sense.  If you’re in the city, 50 miles inland, as I said, let the folks on the island and immediate coast get out of harm’s way before you take to the very few highways and byways north or west.

I was watching Rita’s progress, starting Monday.  On Tuesday, non-essential staff  members were  released from work to prepare for the Big One.  I started  packing essentials, planning to go to my parents’ home in Dallas on Thursday.  By Wednesday, the roads were already jammed, and I was re-thinking that plan.  My parents were worried, but I said I’d rather wait until the roads cleared some.  They never did. You say it on tv, people sitting for hours in 100 degree heat, no water or food, no restrooms, no gas.  People got sick, and some died.  I let my friends & family know I would be sitting this one out.  My friend Judy in Connecticut said “can’t you take the train?” I had to laugh – we don’t do trains down south.

I was busy, busy busy the next couple of days, trying to figure out what was most precious so I could protect it.  Photos, mementos, my first edition signed copies of Kinky Friedman’s books … I figured the roof might come off, so I carried things downstairs. Then I considered the likely flooding, and carried it back upstairs. Then I thought, what the hell, I’ll put what I can on the stairs, put Kinky in a plastic water-tight container, and hope for the best.

As Rita drew nearer, she was downgraded to a 4. I talked to my dad, said we’d been through lots of storms like that safely, hadn’t we, and he said yes we had.  I sat up most of the night, watching the tree outside my window swaying in the wind, and by morning it was all over.

Now we’re watching Gustav. I think Kinky is still in that tote, but I better check.