Hurricanes

Hurricanes:

   I remember three distinct hurricanes in my life time that hit New Jersey and affected my life.

Hurricane Gloria (85)

      What I remember about Hurricane Gloria is my two older brothers fake fighting with fallen tree limbs, outside, during the storm.  Yeah, I know one is a doctor and the other is a rocket scientist….I guess they weren’t always the smart boys that we have grown to know and love…..  Sorry boys, I hope there are no hard feelings, remember I do have Cancer.  I imagine my oldest brother was supposed to watch us while my parents were working.  I have no idea what my little brother was doing at the time. He was only three.  I am also sure that I did get my own punishment (from my brothers) because I am sure I ratted them out for going out during the hurricane.  After all, they taught us in school to stay in a safe location during a hurricane.

Hurricane Floyd (1999)

  I was in college during this hurricane.  What I remember most about Floyd was all the rain.  It was intense and non-stop.  The governor did not declare it a state of emergency so classes were not cancelled.  I remember watching out the window and seeing members of the swim team walking to class in speedos, swim caps, and flippers.  Of course thinking about all the water during Floyd brought me to another funny story.  This story involved a French exchange student, take out chicken wings, a broken radiator, and three flights of wet slippery stairs.  I will share that story in a future blog.

Hurricane Irene (current day 2011)

  The day started off just great.  I had a hard time falling asleep due to the noisy wind and rain. I was worried so I clock watched. I remember seeing 3:30 and then drifting off to sleep.  The girls woke up around 4:00 because of the noise and rain hitting the windows. I told them that it was still very early and we all should be sleeping. I closed their door and prayed they did not wake up their brother.  I am pretty sure I fell back asleep only to be woken up by Stephen telling me that we lost power.  Thank you Irene and Thank you Stephen.  I was fortunate to get a little snooze in when Shua went in for his nap.  The best part of my nap was Elisheva waking me up “Ruthie is reading her book, Daddy is reading his book, and I am not.”  Me: “Elisheva, I was sleeping but now I am not.”

I will say Rabbi Zwickler you have an awesome community to be the rabbi of.  So many people helped us out during these days without power.  We were able to save most of our food in other people’s houses.  We were able to do “milk runs” for Shua to keep him properly fed.  We had a lovely dinner prepared for us and it was nice to eat a yummy hot home cooked meal. We heard about other people (don’t want to mention anyone that doesn’t want to be publicly mentioned) who hooked up extension cords to help pump out fellow friends. What an awesome feeling to be a part of such a helpful, kind, and caring community.

I am sure Stephen and I would have been fine without power for a few days.  When  you have kids it gets a little trickier.  Here are some highlights:

    **Shua throwing up in his bed and not being able to truly clean his smelly sheets.

    **Elisheva breaking her bed rail and falling out of bed in the middle of the night due to the total blackness.  (darkening shades really do work).  Needless to say from that point on she slept with her flashlight on and in her hand.

    **Stephen packing up freezer food to put in someone else’s house and packing up my jelly beans instead of meatballs.  Stephen: “It was really dark and hard to see.”

   **And just when you think things are quiet again.  Beep—beep---beep the fire alarms start to go off due to the low battery.  I definitely had Phoebe like thoughts regarding the fire alarms.  If I could have reached them, they would be in my backyard neighbor’s yard…..beeping away.

  **PSE&G man stating “So I am getting the feeling that this block does not have power…” (after checking with about 7 houses on the street)

Treatment update:

Of course I couldn’t just blog about hurricanes.  I have had my last round of the AC part of the Chemo treatment.  I was very proud of myself for getting to my appointment without having to take a Xanax to calm myself.  Usually the morning of I start to panic a little bit about going to be stabbed and have poison poured into my body.  However, this past Monday, I just didn’t take one and it turned out ok. My oncologist said I look good. However, that made me nervous.  Is the Chemo not working?  Should I be looking good with poison in my body?  She reassured me that some people can tolerate it better than other.  I do hope that is the case.  I have met my halfway mark of Chemotherapy!   Still have a long way to go, but in my mind I really needed to get the four AC doses over with.

Quote: Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get.--- Mark Twain