I grew up in a small town in the Florida panhandle. You probably never heard of Callaway, FL until Hurricane Michael swept through last week on October 10, 2018. Callaway is a suburb of Panama City, FL and a short drive to Tyndall Air Force Base where I'd go shopping or run other errands with my dad, a retired Marine, on most weekends. I went to high school in what became a hurricane evacuation shelter, and spent many afternoons strolling through the downtown marina that washed away in 155 mph winds. A lot can change in a short amount of time.
Only two weeks ago, the Kavanaugh hearing dominated my news feed. Michael was already developing in the Caribbean, but most of us weren't paying attention. Remember Hurricanes Harvey, Maria, and Irma in 2017? I tracked those for days if not weeks in advance. But most of us only started paying attention to Michael last Monday morning, when we were surprised to hear about a storm that had developed in the gulf. Not great news, but so far no big deal. Two days later, we woke up again to another surprise, but this time the news was terrifying - Michael would be the strongest storm on record to hit the Florida panhandle.
I've been through my share of tropical storms and hurricanes, including Hurricane Irma (after she had weakened to wind speeds under 100 mph). Even then, she sounded angry and the people who compare the sound of a hurricane to a freight train are spot on. Trees snapping only add to the chaos, and I'm very thankful that I've never experienced the walls shaking, glass shattering, or flood waters rushing in.
When Michael finally made landfall, I witnessed friends and acquaintances experience those terrors in real time, barely able to comprehend what they were going through from the safety of my desk hundreds of miles away. These are real posts from my Facebook feed that day:
Can't reach my parents anymore and the last thing they said was the house was being blown in.
Just got word that the front door of the hotel my parents are staying in just blew off
They moved back to the back bedroom with 1 window and put the futon up against it
My sister texted. Said the shed was gone and windows were breaking.
All the rooms are f-'ed except a guest bedroom and a bathroom. There are five of them hiding in a closet.
My feed blew up like this for a little while, and then went silent. Communication ceased when the cell towers went down, and then picture by picture we started to see the wreckage Michael left in his path. Even though I'm filled with grief at every natural disaster, this one literally hit close to home and affected me in a more profound way.
Living off the Florida coast might sound like paradise, but I didn't love growing up in the Panama City suburbs. Not that it was an objectively bad place to live. But I often daydreamed of moving off to college and then chasing a career in a big city. The appeal of urban life, strangely, was the big city anonymity while simultaneously making a name for myself. I think a lot of us feel that way about our hometowns - that one day we'll leave and move on to bigger and better things. I did eventually move away to college. My parents also sold their house and moved shortly after I left. That was many years ago, and I've only visited my old stomping grounds twice since then. I really haven't been back or looked back.
I don't think I appreciated the slower pace of a sleepy beach town or the close-knit culture of a smaller community while I lived there. But I appreciate it now. Sleepy but perhaps more patient as the community slowly rebuilds. Close-knit and perhaps more capable of coming together in support of one another. We are unfortunately inundated with big news stories, each equally or more deserving of our time and attention than the last. Mandalay Bay, Charlottesville, Harvey, Wildfires, Refugees, #neveragain, #metoo... It seems we are in a constant state of emergency, both figuratively and literally. Much of Puerto Rico is still without power a year after Hurricane Maria. And the hurricane that gripped a nation one week ago is already fading into the background. As I scanned my daily feed today, half of the posts have moved on to Halloween, weekend plans, and the usual political chatter. The other half are still dealing with the aftermath of widespread destruction, outages, and looting. I know it's only natural for people to move on, but I can't help feeling disappointed and sad that a disaster of this magnitude can't hold our collective attention any longer than that. I can only hope to call attention to my hometown community just a little while longer. I'll leave links at the bottom of this post if you would like to donate. Please also read on for inspiring words from ground zero. It was written yesterday morning by my schoolmate's husband, and is shared with his permission.
People have asked me how I feel, how I'm holding up, how I'm...etc. Here's where I am with things:
I am incredibly humbled at the outpouring of love and support we have experienced. My family is currently staying with our friends...They immediately opened their home to us and my mom, dad, and brother. Their church family has brought by extra supplies to make sure we don't eat them out of house and home. :)
When I travel to Panama City, I see the progress being made to clear downed trees off of power lines, to put new poles in the ground (I'd like to know the number of new poles installed when this is all over) and I see the National Guard dispensing food and water.
I see churches that no longer have buildings, including our own...setting up to dispense supplies to those in need.
So I feel very blessed and loved. But there's another thing I feel like.
I feel like a voyeur.
No, I'm not going door to door snooping. I don't have to. Instead, I can watch drone footage looking down into hangars at Tyndall AFB and see planes sitting in them. When I drive around town trying to check on my family's homes, I can see into peoples' homes because there are no walls. I see their life's belongings piled outside their homes because they've been damaged so badly they can't be salvaged. I see homes that I didn't even know existed because the thick layers of trees that used to screen them from the road are now gone. (Did you all know there's a huge tower-like home on 231 across from the incinerator?)
Most uncomfortable to many of us though, is probably seeing the emotions that people are no longer hiding. In our day to day lives we probably ask how someone is doing 5+ times a day but we don't really expect an honest answer. We expect "I'm fine, how are you?" But now we don't even have to ask. We SEE the hurt, the worry, and the uncertainty. And that's okay. When I talk to friends, I hear the grief in their voices. The worry. And that's okay too.
So, if you've read through this and are wondering if there's a point to it: Our lives have been changed profoundly. Things won't go back to the way they were, no matter how hard we try. Just because they're different though, doesn't mean that they are over. Or that the rest of them will be terrible. Different is just...different. It's not wrong, or right. It's just different.
Hopefully as we [rebuild] our lives and our community we can work to build it better. We've had to humble ourselves to ask for help. Maybe we can be a little more open with our neighbors and friends and loved ones. Perhaps we can find out the names of those that live around us and be a little more connected. We've pulled together to help each other in this time of need. Can we keep those ties and make the fabric of our community stronger?
-Robert Heath