I survived Hurricane Irma

Feels like i should have a Tshirt with this saying. It started last Monday, Sept. 4, when we realized this storm was a wicked Cat. 5 and headed to Florida. All last week was nothing but prep, prep, prep. The book I had to turn into an editor this week got put on hold. No more Mating Frenzy. Instead it was Hurricane Frenzy for Bonnie.

When you live in Florida and you've been thru a few hurricanes, if you are smart, you don't wait. Good thing we did not and had our water, which I actually got the Friday before. Four days before the storm, no water in Publix. No bread. Even the wine was running out. Gas running low. A few friends and acquaintances said "GOOD BYE I'M GETTING THE HELL OUT OF HERE IF THIS IS A CAT. 5."  Some people I know who live in a vulnerable rental went to Georgia, where, ironically, the hurricane followed them straight to Atlanta. It was as if Irma didn't want them to miss out.

We did not evacuate. We could not. DH works as the sole electrician in his hospital and has to ride out the storm there. But we are NOT in a flood zone, our house is concrete, with a strong roof, and we have impact windows.

Thank you sweet Jesus that we invested in those windows. I was NOT leaving my husband or my dogs. NEVER. There are those of us who have spouses who are either first responders or close to it, hospital personnel. They are on the front lines. They cannot leave.

If you've ever been through a hurricane, you will understand the feeling of panic and dread from watching The Weather Channel, seeing those models. For a long while, it looked like Irma would hit us as a Cat. 5 on the east coast. Maybe a cat. 4 if we were lucky. I kept analyzing the track, looking at latitude and longitude from the National Hurricane Center and trying ot figure out how bad the winds would be against our house.

Then I would look at the 10-day forecast for my area. Sunday: Rain and winds up to 130 mph.

Oh...joy. MORE WINE NEEDED.

To make a long story short, I had to buy lots of dog food, stock up on meds for Cookie and Holly, who has kidney failure, non-perishable food, drag in all the crap we have in the yard (do we really need 12 glow in the dark butterfly lights for the garden?) and weigh down everything that might go flying since we could barely fit a gnat into our packed garage. One of our neighbors took our bikes to store it.

Saturday, DH went into the hospital early and later that day when it started getting nasty, I took doggies and a suitcase and went to a good friend's house down the street. I was too scared to stay
alone, after Hurricane Wilma, when a tree fell on the exact same spot where I'd been standing ten minutes earlier. We settled into their house, and Holly proceeded to investigate each nook and cranny, searching for their cat.

We all went to sleep and then at 4 am. woke up to the horrific sound of the wind blowing against the house. Sunday was "hunker down day" and taking Holly outside to pee during the least of the winds, which meant about 30 mph. We had gusts up to 95 mph and six tornado warnings. Each time there was a tornado warning on my phone, my friend would say, "Well, this requires more wine."

Reason why you stock up for hurricanes. And why you have good friends to stay with during a hurricane.

We were very very fortunate. It went up the west coast. However, it was a huge storm, 400 miles across. Florida is only 170 miles across. So we got the dirty side with all the tornadoes.

Late Monday morning after the hurricane was past us, DH came home, came over and ate a sandwich at our friends while we swapped storm stories. Their power never went out. Then we packed up all my stuff and doggies and drove home. Trees down in the street, on the sidewalk.

Power out at my house.

Monday night was miserable. Trying to sleep in 90 degree temps without a/c or fans. I was worried most of all about Holly, who can get dangerously overheated, and that is very bad for her renal failure. Finally I hit on the solution of wetting a Tshirt and tossing it into our freezer (we have a generator). I would set it on a pad and put her on it. It helped a little. She did not want to leave my side, poor dog. She was a little spooked. Cookie fared much better. She's nearly 15 and deaf, and slept through most of it and the aftermath as well.

But fortunately, our power came back on yesterday. And I'm so proud of my husband. Because he came up with the idea to turn off the main power to the hospital, which kept flickering, they were able to run solely on generators and perform emergency surgery on a man with a brain bleed. He helped to save that man's life. THAT is why we could not evacuate.

There's still cleaning up to do, and emotionally, I'm exhausted and emotionally spent, as are many other Floridians. The Keys are wrecked. I wanted to weep when I saw footage of the Keys, all the wonderful places where we go to relax, and the flooding in Jacksonville. Just this morning they found 5 people had died in a nursing home in Hollywood. More than half the state is still without power, but they are working hard at restoring it.

Texas had Harvey. We had Irma. It's over now and the clean-up and restoration begins.