An update on my life (for those of you who might actually care)

Monday, August 29, 2011

An update on my life (for those of you who might actually care)

In 1999, I went through a devastating flood as a result of Hurricane Floyd. I lived in a one floor ranch with no basement that ended up with three feet of muddy, sewage filled water in it. So yes, that means the kitchen was flooded, and the living room, and the bedrooms and bathroom. Picture your bedroom filled with 3 feet of water.

The floodwaters came quickly and we didn’t expect it would get into the house so we didn’t have much time to prepare. We had to throw out all of our furniture, our carpet, the bottom half of all of our walls, and many, many sentimental personal items (such as all of my class pictures from elementary school, a beautiful scrapbook from a friend, and the only picture taken of me and my ex during our relationship).

I no longer live in that house, but my mother does, and Hurricane Irene caused almost as much damage. There was 29” of water in the house. The only thing that was better this time is that we were more prepared. We managed to get some of her furniture out of her house in advance and move most of the sentimental items to higher ground. We spent all of today ripping out carpets and moving things to the backyard to dry them out.

It will take weeks of active work to get their house into livable shape. So right now, my mother, stepmother and 6 year old brother are living with me. It’s a little weird, as my husband and I are super lazy, and how we have permanent houseguests to entertain. We’ve been making them watch Friday Night Lights at night after my brother goes to sleep and that’s been the one nice thing we’ve been doing.

I’m telling you all this for two reasons. One is to explain my Degrassi fandom absence though I’ll be popping into Twitter a little bit. I have a oneshot halfway finished that I would like to put up in the next two days if I can, but then I probably will need to take a significant break from writing.

The other is that I watched what people were saying on Twitter while the storm was occurring. People were complaining that everyone overreacted to the storm and that it was boring and nothing happened. People were comparing it to other tragedies and saying it wasn’t a big deal in comparison. Here’s the truth kids: Every tragedy is equally awful when it’s happening to you. And if it wasn’t, you should count your blessings.

Think before you tweet.