IT WASN'T KATRINA. IT WAS IRENE

August 30, 2011

The following was intended to be a brief response to an e-mail from my friend, Ellen Stern, who'd seen the news that my piece of the mountain had taken a pounding and wanted to know how we'd fared. Judging by the length, I guess I got carried away, but so did Irene. We've seen many a Catskill mountain thunderstorm, tyrannical things with sheets and bolts of lightning coming from both earth and sky, an awesome show of force. But they don't last very long. Then came Irene: no thunder, no lightning, not even much wind, just relentless rain. Twelve straight and constant hours of it. It was like being trapped in a room as the water rises above your neck. In some cases, that's exactly what happened. A Poe story. The Titanic. I was going to say that other natural disasters, like earthquakes, are, at least, quick, hit and run, over fast, but they really aren't at all, only the earthquake, and that feels like eternity.

This seems to be more of a blog than an e-mail, so let's call it that. A blog. Working on a computer almost as old as my daughter and can't access usual blog format. So this is it. I'm writing in Boston as the phone and power are still out back home in Spruceton Valley. I'm a little discombobulated due to the evacuation -- can't quite get my bearings -- but the kids are their usually sterling selves making me feel very comfortable. I do feel uneasy at having left some of the neighbors behind. My intent had been to stay as well. The storm was over. The river was dropping. The danger passed. Why not? The weather was exquisite.

The morning after the rain subsided I was out on what used to be the road lugging flotsam to the creek side when my neighbor from the lovely little horse farm up the road walked down drinking her morning mug of coffee. We bad-mouthed Irene for awhile as she slurped her coffee, and I started salivating because I hadn't had coffee in three days. "God, what I wouldn't give for a cup of coffee," I cried. "Wait here," she said, walked back to her house (She had a generator and was using it two hours a day), and returned in a few minutes with a pot and a mug, lots of 1/2 & 1/2 and sugar, just like I like it. Two of our young volunteer firemen managed to get up the valley in ATV's to check on us. They came up during that seven foot blizzard, too. The owner of a small cabin down the road collected firewood tossed up by the river, lit a bonfire, and invited the rest of us. At another time his place was the one room schoolhouse. That night the sky was radiant.

Jamie, from her side of the country, followed the news on both CNN and the LATimes. She'd heard reports of old people trapped on back roads and figured I must be one of them. Might've been trapped. Didn't feel old.

As for her side of the country, I'll be there soon, 9/13-9/21, speaking at the Screenwriting Expo, Friday, 9/16, 4pm, LAX Westin Hotel. Topic: Your Screenplay;Your Novel. Hope to see some of you there and elsewhere.

Sorry for the digression. Had to get that in there.

Now.

A few of you have already seen a version of the following. It has been tinkered with, however, so not exactly the same. I wouldn't mind if you checked it out again.

Dear Ellen:

No matter the adventure, it usually comes down to this: don't mess with Mother Nature. Of course, Michelle Bachman said it was a message from G-d to cut the budget. From my POV the message from G-d was: you're on your own, Stevo. I'm fine and now in Boston with the kids, but this Irene lady was the real thing. Our house survived with no damage but a flood in the basement, but the old, hand-built stone retaining wall to the stream next to the house was turned into rubble, and the water came over the bank and inched toward the house as the downpour dribbled out: fourteen inches! Twelve hours. The river in front of the house slammed at a harsh angle into our stream emptying into it, and the road basically buckled and blew. At one point I watched the river breach the bank it had just battered away -- this was fast stuff, wave-like, no trickle, no slow flow -- hammer its way over the bridge, and make the road its own. Move over, sucka! Road never had a chance. Mind blowing destruction everywhere. A farmer nearby watched 200 of his cows drown when the river took out his pasture. Prattsville, where I often find myself, was destroyed. Not an exaggeration. Jim's American Market took in four feet of water. Agway pushed off its foundation and filled with mud, friends stuck on the roof watching the water rise as the Nat'l Guard sent for more boats. Jamie followed the flood on the news from Los Angeles! Over in Windham, the Catskill Mountain Country Store -- you, Katie, & I ate lunch there -- gone. Drew, the owner, watched a wave push a car through his building. It's transfixing to watch big maples and ash trees churn by at high speed as boulders grind along the bottom. You have to believe what you are seeing but you can't. Power and phone were (and are) out in Spruceton Valley. Friends stranded up the valley walked out to where they could be evacuated by the Nat'l Guard who were everywhere they could be although that wasn't nearly as many places as they were needed. I opted to stay figuring I had enough food and water for a week which was the estimate we were given. There would be others within walking distance, and, anyway, I had to find a way to the auto mechanic to have my brakes fixed at 8am next.

I hear of a possible route, so, fingers crossed, I drive down the valley astonished at the destruction, cross the final bridge past a sign I ignored, and took a bunch of back roads (cf: Robert Mitchum, Thunder Road, ca. 1953) which eventually got me to Haines Falls Auto. Palenville, one more town down the mountain, could no longer be reached due to landslide and blow-down. OK. Got the brakes fixed, bought food and dog food, and headed back over the mountains to a great view of the valley, but, more importantly, I thought I could get cell reception there, did, called Jamie who was relieved and said the family wanted me to pack up and drive to Boston. I know the kids love me but are they gonna love me for twelve days in a row? After that I'm going to LA to give a talk at the Screenwriting Expo.I wouldn't be home for weeks! I told her to tell everyone I was fine and so was the house but let me think about it. I just bought food, etc. etc. So I drive back to the valley conflicted, reach bridge #1 -- Remember the sign I ignored? -- am stopped by a roadblock of state police, Nat'l Guard, and highway guys who tell me that if I go in I can't get out for a week plus I had to leave my car and walk. Not one more vehicle was going over that bridge. Four miles up through a flood zone? With shopping bags in one hand and my ancient, crippled dachshund under the arm opposite? "Come on, Brad!" (I know the fellow. His father used to have a dairy farm on Jenkins Flats). It didn't matter I knew him. Or his father. The bridge had a one foot tear in it since I crossed that morning and was twisting counter clockwise. A plan developed. There was a government truck on the other side of the bridge. He'd give me a ride up and leave me there, or he'd wait fifteen minutes for me to pack my bag. OK. Seven days ("Maybe," said Brad). Seven days -- maybe more was Brad's subtext -- seven days without being able to communicate with the family, and the family having no idea what's going on. "Twenty minutes, " I said to Brad. "Fifteen." "Come on!" "Just go." Twenty minutes later after packing a bag and turning off all the power switches so the sudden whenever-it-would-come surge of electricity wouldn't blow our whole house out the instant Central Hudson gets it going, I'm in a truck being evacuated from my own home. Who said we were in charge? The good stuff was neighbors helping each other out. The only service station with gas and power jacked his prices up a dollar a gallon. A caller announced this on local radio, and when I finally drove out of here I saw his prices were again the same as everyone else's. So now I'm in Boston with the kids, on my small level a refugee having been given 15 minutes to pack and leave, but this is by no means the worst of what could have happened to me, did happen to many of my neighbors, or what has happened other times and other places. I'm the fortunate one, but I can imagine those times and places like I never have before. So much stuff to remember to pack. So much stuff forgotten. I left my computer glasses on my desk and a Hebrew National salami in a beer cooler on the front porch. A Chassidic man in his eighties watched as his wife of a lifetime drowned in the kitchen. He'd waded out to snag a boat and couldn't get back to her. She had been a Holocaust survivor.