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After The Storm

by Steven Wagenheim
9 replies
  • OFF TOPIC
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When I first started dating my wife back in 80, we went to Seaside Heights in
NJ that summer. It was one of the most wonderful times in my life.

20 something years later, we would take our daughter to Point Pleasant because
it was closer and you know how kids hate long drives.

Today, they're both gone. No, not seriously damaged.

Just gone.

You can't begin to imagine the devastation that fell upon the Jersey shore until
you see it.

Relatively speaking, I was lucky. I lost power and Internet for 3.5 days and had
to drive about 50 miles just to get a can of tuna and a couple of rolls so we
could have something to eat.

I still wait for the lights to suddenly go out. I think they call it shell shock.

During the 3 nights without light or heat, something wonderful happened.

My wife and I did something we hadn't done, well, ever.

We would sit on the couch, candles burning, listening to 99.1 on the radio
and cuddling for warmth. It was beyond romantic, even as we sat there
near freezing to death.

I will actually miss those romantic evenings, even if I don't miss the reason
why we had them in the first place.

Today, I'm trying to get out from under the avalanche of emails and other
issues that I have to take care of. My business, what's left of it, is so far
behind I may never catch up. The loss of income plus the expenses we're
going to have to incur because of all this will probably make this the worst
year I've had since 2000 when I lost my last corporate America job.

No, I'm not coming here looking for a handout or any kind of help. I come from
a very proud family that just doesn't believe in that stuff, though we'll be
the first ones to lend a helping hand when and if we can. Somehow, we'll
get through this. At least we still have our home.

One can't be changed by an event like this. Things that used to be so
important to me are now quite trivial. I'm honestly wondering if I'll ever get
upset over anything stupid ever again.

I hope all of you who were affected by Sandy are well. My state will never
be the same again. The damage is in the tens of billions of dollars. There is
a shortage of food and gas and God knows what else. Our local supermarket
is only partially open and only for 2 hours a day.

I remember seeing the movie "The Day After" and thinking, "That's never
going to happen."

This week, we came closer than I ever want to come again.

Hug a loved one tonight folks.

Because you really don't know what tomorrow will bring.
  • Profile picture of the author Jesse L
    It is a blessing that you still have a home and that everyone is OK. There are some that will never recover.

    One thing is certain in life, Nothing remains the same and change is inevitable... like it or not.

    I'm happy you and your family are OK, the rest you can handle, I have no doubt.

    JL

    PS
    And to get those romantic nights, just go out and shut off the electric every so often... ooops, another blackout.
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    The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will. – Vince Lambardi

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  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    STEVE! -- I was wondering if you were okay. Thanks for posting to let us know.

    I'm sorry about the storm - but glad you found yourself. It sounds like you might have been blown back on the right track. Hope you and your town recover quickly, but also hope you never lose the "good" part of it.
    Signature

    Sal
    When the Roads and Paths end, learn to guide yourself through the wilderness
    Beyond the Path

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    • Profile picture of the author Kay King
      Steve -

      I'm one that can imagine - I know what it looks like and, worse, what it feels like. It hits you at your core even if you didn't lose your own home.

      No, it won't be the same - but it will BE. What surprised me on the coast was how long it takes to come back from this devastation. It disappears from the news after a few weeks but it takes years of rebuilding. To make yourself feel a bit better - go through your house and donate anything you can do without to those who need it. When I did that after Katrina I was amazed at much "stuff" I had. I gave away the furniture in my little used guest room and, instead of missing it, I felt great helping a child who had lost everything.

      So many stayed in the path of the storm in spite of a week of warnings about how bad it would be. Same thing happened here because, as you said, that level of devastation is hard to imagine. There a belief "it won't be that bad" - and sometimes it's worse than bad.

      I feel for the people in your state. We had to deal with extreme heat but the cold is going to make it harder for them. We didn't have the level of looting that seems to have happened in the NE - perhaps because the National Guard was called out immediately here.

      When a storm was approaching last month I went through my usual drill. At the first suggestion of a storm I buy bread and lunch meat, stock up on gallons of water and batteries, fill the car with gas and get cash from the bank. That way i'm ready to run or to hunker down. The gallons of water go into the freezer. Bread/batteries/flashlights and water disappear quickest off the shelves here so I assume that was true there, too.

      The shock will pass and your business will recover - but you don't forget something like that...ever.

      Hang in there.

      kay
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  • Profile picture of the author RedShifted
    I live right by the Raritan Bay literally a walk from Union Beach. My home is about 150 ft from the water.

    We had a mandatory evacuation but I was one of the stupid ones who stayed. Why did I stay? I hate to sound ignorant, but a lot of NJ folks just don't understand hurricanes. Nor do we really fear them (prior to Sandy/Irene) because they rarely make direct hits like they have the last couple of years.

    My rational was this: "Well they hyped up hurricane irene last year and I evacuated and barely anything happened.... so this year I'm staying". At first I was confident in my decision. That was untill monday around 2pm. Thats right around when the winds started to really pick up. So I got in my car and drove to the beach.

    I park my car in a parking lot right behind our dunes. The wind is fairly strong but still nothing to scare me.

    That was UNTILL I walked past the dunes. Then OMG. I walked around the side of the dunes, where there were no dunes, and the second my face hit open sea air I was hit by a branch and tripped on my ass. I saw a lot of people on the beach, doing some really stupid things.

    Some were standing on the piers, with their hands in the air, screaming and cheering. When in the meantime debree is being blown into people and water is moving up the beach fast. I remember thinking "some of these people are definitely dying tonight". There were so many, and thats when I realized how ignorant *I* was. Just by being by them it made me feel like a jackass.

    Occassionally a strong gust would throw me right off my feet and I'd scramble my footing so I didn't fall. The 3rd time that happened, I fell right into a puddle of sea water. Thats when I decided its time to race back to my car and go home.

    As I was leaving, I saw about 6 cop cars coming down the road driving right to where we were. They took out horns and started screaming at the locals "GET OFF THE BEACH NOW AND GO TO YOUR HOMES!" Then they flagged/blocked the area off.

    I went home and now I'm standing on my feet with the doors open, watching trees that are surrounding my home. Things pick up around 6pm and this is when I hear trees falling everywhere. This is also when I see these bright flashes of green all around our neighborhood. I'm thinking "it looks like lightning... but its green? what the hell is it?" Then 30mins later a transformer explodes right in front of my home and I understand. Transformers everywhere are falling on the ground and exploding.

    Around 6:30 I hear a HUGE cracking sound, run to the back of my home towards the noise, and see my neighbors tree fall right on their house. Completely obliterated their roof. This is when I become really paranoid because I have a tree standing right by the side of my home. Around 8pm, that tree actually broke, but not the entire thing. It was a large 20 foot branch, that fell off the tree, onto my roof, and right on our powerlines.

    Then around midnight things calmed down so fast. I got up the next morning, walked around my nieghborhood and couldn't believe my eyes. Homes that were destroyed, cars in spots cars shouldn't be. Trees down on every block. Cars crushed. Docks washed into the road, I immediately knew this was serious.

    As bad as I though my area got hit, when I went to Toms River.. I was just speech less. I saw a boat that had flown right through the middle of a home. Cars pushed through garages. Foundations that were crippled. Homes without roofs. Foundation blocks where there once was homes. This hurricane has turned our world upside down. The only normalcy I've seen so far was my power coming on yesterday. But SO MANY people are still w/out power, and its freezing cold outside.

    I just hope weather like this doesn't become more consistent. It seems like NJ is becoming more prone to hurricanes because of the blocking highs forming in iceland. Along with meandaring jet streams that create negative air spaces to the west of the mid atlantic. Then add to that a warming atlantic ocean. And honestly I don't think this will be the last severe hurricane that hits this area. I don't have any firm beliefs about global warming, but something about our weather is definitely changing.

    I think it has something to do with the poles shifting. Many people don't realize that when the poles shift, our magnetic shield weakens, allowing more energy in from the sun. So I don't know. Maybe more sun energy is hitting the atlantic ocean. Or maybe it is global warming. Something is definitely changing. We're having less frequent hurrricanes, but they're becoming more severe, and changing paths it seems.

    I honestly have no idea. All I know is if we get another hurricane that hits us directly in the next 1-2 years, then I definitely know something is up. If you read NJs history with hurricanes, most are not hurricanes by the time they hit. And the high majority don't hit us directly from east to west. In fact, I don't think any hurricanes have. So if this happens again, I will probably wind up moving further inland.

    -Rob
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    • Profile picture of the author Kay King
      I think media hype does play a part as every potential hurricane is dramatically discussed yet we know most aren't as bad as they could be. But, then, some of them are as bad - or worse - than predicted.

      This storm was forecast perfectly - the path was correctly charted. Irene played a part as so many just didn't believe the forecast because Irene wasn't "as bad" as expected. I personally don't understand why any of the people living on islands chose to stay.

      Can you imagine how it was a hundred years ago when storms were known only if fisherman came in telling about an approaching hurricane?

      The one mistake every state/locality seems to make is not providing adequate transportation out of the area. Evacuating is expensive as is leaving your home and the risk of looting that entails. Of course, some would complain about not being provided free places to stay but shelters away from the coast could solve that.

      It seems to me areas should evacuate housing projects and lower income areas by providing school buses for residents and should bring in national guard before the storm to protect property after the event.
      In New Orleans, hundreds of school buses were destroyed in a parking lot while people without cars or money had no way to leave town. That didn't make sense to me and it still doesn't.

      Glad you are OK but I don't envy the rebuilding needed now. Going to be a rough time for a while for a lot of people.
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      Saving one dog will not change the world - but the world changes forever for that one dog
      ***
      My ducks are absolutely not in a row. I don't even know where some of them are...
      ...and I'm pretty sure one of them is a pigeon.
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    • Profile picture of the author Kurt
      Originally Posted by RedShifted View Post

      I live right by the Raritan Bay literally a walk from Union Beach. My home is about 150 ft from the water.

      We had a mandatory evacuation but I was one of the stupid ones who stayed. Why did I stay? I hate to sound ignorant, but a lot of NJ folks just don't understand hurricanes. Nor do we really fear them (prior to Sandy/Irene) because they rarely make direct hits like they have the last couple of years.

      My rational was this: "Well they hyped up hurricane irene last year and I evacuated and barely anything happened.... so this year I'm staying". At first I was confident in my decision. That was untill monday around 2pm. Thats right around when the winds started to really pick up. So I got in my car and drove to the beach.

      I park my car in a parking lot right behind our dunes. The wind is fairly strong but still nothing to scare me.

      That was UNTILL I walked past the dunes. Then OMG. I walked around the side of the dunes, where there were no dunes, and the second my face hit open sea air I was hit by a branch and tripped on my ass. I saw a lot of people on the beach, doing some really stupid things.

      Some were standing on the piers, with their hands in the air, screaming and cheering. When in the meantime debree is being blown into people and water is moving up the beach fast. I remember thinking "some of these people are definitely dying tonight". There were so many, and thats when I realized how ignorant *I* was. Just by being by them it made me feel like a jackass.

      Occassionally a strong gust would throw me right off my feet and I'd scramble my footing so I didn't fall. The 3rd time that happened, I fell right into a puddle of sea water. Thats when I decided its time to race back to my car and go home.

      As I was leaving, I saw about 6 cop cars coming down the road driving right to where we were. They took out horns and started screaming at the locals "GET OFF THE BEACH NOW AND GO TO YOUR HOMES!" Then they flagged/blocked the area off.

      I went home and now I'm standing on my feet with the doors open, watching trees that are surrounding my home. Things pick up around 6pm and this is when I hear trees falling everywhere. This is also when I see these bright flashes of green all around our neighborhood. I'm thinking "it looks like lightning... but its green? what the hell is it?" Then 30mins later a transformer explodes right in front of my home and I understand. Transformers everywhere are falling on the ground and exploding.

      Around 6:30 I hear a HUGE cracking sound, run to the back of my home towards the noise, and see my neighbors tree fall right on their house. Completely obliterated their roof. This is when I become really paranoid because I have a tree standing right by the side of my home. Around 8pm, that tree actually broke, but not the entire thing. It was a large 20 foot branch, that fell off the tree, onto my roof, and right on our powerlines.

      Then around midnight things calmed down so fast. I got up the next morning, walked around my nieghborhood and couldn't believe my eyes. Homes that were destroyed, cars in spots cars shouldn't be. Trees down on every block. Cars crushed. Docks washed into the road, I immediately knew this was serious.

      As bad as I though my area got hit, when I went to Toms River.. I was just speech less. I saw a boat that had flown right through the middle of a home. Cars pushed through garages. Foundations that were crippled. Homes without roofs. Foundation blocks where there once was homes. This hurricane has turned our world upside down. The only normalcy I've seen so far was my power coming on yesterday. But SO MANY people are still w/out power, and its freezing cold outside.

      I just hope weather like this doesn't become more consistent. It seems like NJ is becoming more prone to hurricanes because of the blocking highs forming in iceland. Along with meandaring jet streams that create negative air spaces to the west of the mid atlantic. Then add to that a warming atlantic ocean. And honestly I don't think this will be the last severe hurricane that hits this area. I don't have any firm beliefs about global warming, but something about our weather is definitely changing.

      I think it has something to do with the poles shifting. Many people don't realize that when the poles shift, our magnetic shield weakens, allowing more energy in from the sun. So I don't know. Maybe more sun energy is hitting the atlantic ocean. Or maybe it is global warming. Something is definitely changing. We're having less frequent hurrricanes, but they're becoming more severe, and changing paths it seems.

      I honestly have no idea. All I know is if we get another hurricane that hits us directly in the next 1-2 years, then I definitely know something is up. If you read NJs history with hurricanes, most are not hurricanes by the time they hit. And the high majority don't hit us directly from east to west. In fact, I don't think any hurricanes have. So if this happens again, I will probably wind up moving further inland.

      -Rob
      Many climatologists attribute this to climate change/global warming and how it is melting the ice on Greenland, causing high pressure areas to push the storms to the west, instead of their "normal" path of staying at sea.

      If I lived on the East Coast, I would be very concerned about this possibility.
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  • Profile picture of the author kenmichaels
    I just got back from there, your right steve. It will never be the same.

    I had no idea so many warriors lived in that area
    or i would have stopped by and provided a helping hand.
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  • Profile picture of the author thunderbird
    Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim View Post

    <snip>I'm honestly wondering if I'll ever get
    upset over anything stupid ever again.<snip>
    I'm sure I can help you with that.

    I was wondering about you, hoping you were well. I was thinking, wow, I've posted something silly and Steven Wagenheim is probably unable to see it and get annoyed, if not express disapproval in a post. I'm just jealous because you're good at music and I am not.

    I hope you get it all it all fixed up soon. What's the link to buy your songs on itunes? This is what I found:
    https://itunes.apple.com/au/book/how...51692744?mt=11
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    Project HERE.

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    • Profile picture of the author Richard Van
      Hi Steven,

      I really hope everything picks up for you. It's from times like these we rise up a lot stronger and achieve things we often thought we couldn't before.

      I'm sure you're going to do that.

      I really liked the story of you and your wife listening to the radio all cuddled up. It takes those moments to realise the things you actually have, when so much is stripped away like that.

      Good on you for seeing a positive side and as someone watching this on the other side of the pond, I can tell you now, if they say we have this "stiff upper lip" thingy, I can honestly say you lot have it in by the bucket load.

      It was impressive to see how you all pulled together and still are, turning this event back around. And you will.

      Well done.
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