I'd like to say that I haven't written these past few days because of hurricane preparations, but the truth is work, catching up with an old friend, car issues, and sleep deprivation have been the culprits. All of these combined has made my life blog-less and now the storm churning in the gulf has me thinking how I should be concentrating on preparations and not on my computer.
In all my years as a Floridian I have never been prepared for a
hurricane. In my single life I didn't prepare because I was young and
worked for the government who informed me I was required to be on the clock
during any natural disasters. When I was married I had a husband who
didn't believe in preparation ("Where are you going to put all this
stuff? The garage? Because that's the first thing that will go in a
hurricane and all your preparations along with it) and we both worked
for governments that expected us to help evacuate and assist during a
storm. When the kids came and I no longer worked I made arrangements to go to anyone's house
that had a generator since husband was still employed with said government. And as time went on and we were spared a direct hit
from a hurricane I believed that as long as I didn't prepare then it
wouldn't occur. Because that is my superstition and illogical means of
trying to control happenings in my life.
Every June publications print out lists of all the belongings residents should have in preparation for
hurricane season and every June I religiously clipped out that section and carefully filed it away for a time when I would get around to
fulfilling it. I never did. When the warnings would sound I would get water,
batteries, and peanut butter, and once long ago I dutifully videotaped and
archived my home furnishings, but I was clearly unprepared for any long
term non-electric living situation. Even after experiencing a loss of
power when three tropical storms hit our area bam, bam, bam, did I do
nothing more than my norm.
Now here we are waiting
once again to see if we will be in the line of fire. Will we or won't we
is a mantra we have heard all most every hurricane season. I have
collected my required 1 gallon a day of water for the girls and me and
I'm sure I have enough peanut butter, but I'm still sorely lacking. We
have a generator now but I have no idea where it is in our garage or even how to use it. When mentioning this to the husband (who each year seems to be a tad more concerned about storm preparations) he told me it was small enough to juice up our toaster oven and therefore I didn't figure it was anything I needed to get out of the box. Who would buy something like that in the first place?
I tried to collect a few more items each day like paper products, and I decided that not filling my refrigerator with foods that would spoil in a loss of power was a sound idea. I downloaded some Red Cross free apps on my Ipad that help me locate open shelters, walk me through basic first aid, and offer a list for hurricane preparations or a link to a website where I can purchase a hurricane kit for $80. The most I've ever done in the way of preparing.
As the days have progressed the storm is still tropical and not a hurricane and our chances are very slim so what little I have in the way of supplies will be sufficient. We might get some rain and we might get some heavy winds and all of that is enough to cancel school for Monday. Hopefully, it will blow right past us and eventually die out without any harm to anyone. That will give me a little more time to try and complete that list...just in case.
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