The people that I interact with regularly sort of know what October has been. I don't really think anyone has the whole story for themselves, and based on the public nature of this blog, I can't really put all the pieces together for anyone. Maybe that's me not being as transparent as I normally am on this page, perhaps, transparency isn't something you can blindly pursue when other people are involved.
Helene did snap the few threads of grounded presence I had remaining from pre-Burnsville life. I've been in a disassociative state throughout much of October just in preservation of what was already a fractured normal. The end of the month brought some respite; a night planned for months; but arrived with much more baggage than the airlines allow. In many ways, it recollected a piece of me that had been left in a box with a dozen letters, mementos, and snuffed emotions. If you'd asked me the day prior what to expect, it wasn't what happened. My barometer for what is beyond expectation is skewed by the fact, that nothing, outside of my son, has given me much hope of joy beyond a single moment. So, what by an outsiders view may have been a good night, felt exceptional to me. And I think for parties involved, the evening was gauged by similar standards. When the road you are on is blanketed in darkness, the occasional house light or street light is a brief escape from the void, but when you reach a town, there's a sense of safety and comfort. You really don't want that moment to be over, especially when the journey beyond is back to darkness. You take every tangible fiber from the experience and stretch it to it's breaking point, just to relive the moment of being natural, unfiltered, unreproached, untethered from reality. I think you can question whether the moment was who you are, or who you want to be. For me at least, it's both.
But as I said, that was an escape. Not being a social person by nature, something like Helene, especially in a community as rural and small as Burnsville requires reliance on one another. While I didn't actively seek people out in potential need, there's nowhere to go without encountering them. For me, at least in Burnsville, everyone in our complex left except two older women. I assumed the role of gathering supplies for myself, Blixa and the two of them. That often meant taking their cars to wait in hour's long lines for fuel, standing in line and then being escorted through our grocery store to buy what supplies were available, and giving them cash from journeys to Asheville to work and check on Hannah. None of it was easy, but it never really sunk in, it was just a matter of what we had to do that day to get to the next day. We had no services for a full two weeks, but we did have a home, and thankfully the weather was mild - this would have been intolerable in The South. The hardest part, was not being able to communicate with anyone outside of my neighbors. I didn't know who cared if I was missing, and I had no way to reassure people I was okay. I had no clue to the extent of the devastation except by word of mouth. People I would wait in line with would share stories about seeing neighbors being ripped away by the river, or seeing houses removed from their foundations and tossed into other homes. Utterly surreal stories that you hear on the news were now being conveyed by people I share a community with. There's nothing that prepares you for first-hand exchanges with people that are in shock and incapable of processing what they've experienced. When I measure my 50+ years of trauma, to their past 24 hours, I feel ashamed. If it weren't for my supervisor, and her ability to rally the carriers that work with us, no one at my place of employment would have made it through that first week. She and her husband brought carloads of supplies from SC, and coordinated with our carriers to do the same. It was enough for me to have what I needed, share with my neighbors, and provide supplies to Hannah. I will never forget how quickly she responded to her peers, and the devotion she had to us to get us through the hardest week.
I don't want to describe the more morbid experiences I had in those first two weeks, because as an observer, I don't feel it's the right thing to do to try and paint a picture of a tragedy that has forever altered thousand's of lives. To the best of my knowledge, everyone I know and love came out the other side of this only inconvenienced. Many of the people I've met since the storm, are forever different. One thing that I began to learn as my normalcy sprinkled in, and thanks to the generosity of a close friend that opened her home to me, is that an entire political fight was happening around this and lies were being circulated that were counter to my lived experiences. Of course, as with any tragedy on this scale, it's your neighbors more fortunate that are your lifeline, setting up spaces in neighborhoods, parks, churches to provide whatever they can to their community. That was very much the case for Burnsville. The day after the storm, someone I've never seen before or since brought fresh water from a well for Blixa and I... knocking on every door he saw and offering to whomever answered. By the following Monday, resources like FEMA and the national guard were already in town providing relief, meals, internet access spots, and information. By the end of the first week, organizations such as Samaritans were in town offering laundry, showers, and meals. There was no lack of help, and all of them are still here despite Florida taking a Category 4 hurricane only days later. It pains me to have witnessed what should be a sacred event that unites people, being used to hurt people. This has given me a better appreciation for school shootings, and disaster-type tragedies that befall communities all over the world. Lives are forever-altered, and it means nothing but an opportunity to distort truth to some.
That's really all I wanted to say for now. I'm broken, maybe moreso than I was, but I also feel fortunate. One that my life hasn't been changed forever, but also because I did have people concerned; that offered me their home and resources, and especially for a night that allowed me to feel like myself; my old self. And I think, it was enough, that I want to be that person again, and I feel motivated to figure out how.
No comments:
Post a Comment