Helene

I'm woken up by the howling of the wind. I get up and flip the light switch. Nothing. I flip it up and down a couple more times. The power is out. I head downstairs to see my family sitting in the living room. They've come to the same realization. Once we had come to terms with the current situation, we went into strategy mode. The basement was flooded and branches littered the yard. But first, breakfast. Father started making some bacon on the propane-powered grill outside. I played some music that I had downloaded on the speaker outside. The crack of tree branches could be heard in the distance. Some much closer. We decided to head out for supplies. Most of the roads were blocked. Trees were toppled over, some across the roads, some on houses, and some trees that took power lines down with them. Large areas of what used to be land was now flooded. The power lights were out, so it was a metaphorical free-for-all. We managed to get to a local hardware store and purchase a power inverter. Everyone was sold out of generators. Most grocery stores were either deserted or at full capacity. We began making the journey back home. 

The next day, my sister and brother-in-law came over with their kids to seek refuge at our house, since were the only ones with the means to make food. We decided to play a board game. It had fantastic art. The storm has calmed a bit. It was a slow day. For lunch, we had sandwiches. The meat was kept cold by the bag of ice we had bought the day before. We had some down time and my sister was getting restless, so we went to Target. Unsurprisingly, it was packed. The lines were practically out the door. We left soon after finding this out. We endured the line at a Chick-fil-a and got drinks. We went home. The rest of the day consisted of preparing, reinforcing, and grazing on the dry goods we had set out on the table. It was a humid night, but we survived. 

The idea of getting ice, propane, or charcoal is unheard of. The church had power and many people were charging their phones and laptops there. The roads were busy with people working on the powerlines and fixing the internet. The lines for McDonalds, 7Brew, and QT were still bleeding out into the road. I resorted to sitting in the car with the AC on and computer plugged in to work on things. My sister and brother-in-law came over again for dinner. We had spaghettini. After dinner everyone dispersed. My other sister and her fiancée went to her room, father went to his usual outside post, mother went to work on school, and I went to work on the blog. Tomorrow, I would wake up at 5:00 AM to accompany my other sister to her opening shift at the coffee shop.  Wednesday night, after dinner the power turned back on. I was sick but it was nice to have power again. Everyone was relived to have light, and I was relived to have air conditioning. Now, we will all begin the process of adjusting back into normal life. It was quite the interesting experience.