Irma la Douche

Hurricane Wilma in 2005, put the fear of Mother Nature in me. Wilma was more intense than Katrina, who hit about three weeks earlier. Wilma was in fact the most intense hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic at that time, but because of the broken levee in New Orleans, Wilma didn't get that much attention. I swore that I would never go through such a terrifying storm again and set about to sell off our Florida assets. Unfortunately the housing bubble burst in 2006 trapping me in Florida for ten more years.

For anybody who has never been through a hurricane, let me tell you it is scary. We had hurricane shutters and the sound of things slamming into them all night long conjured up all sorts of scenarios in my mind. I wondered what the hell was going on out there? Then when dawn broke and the winds subsided, I went outside to see the neighbor's tool shed at the bottom of my pool along with the neighbor's tree and the fence that divided my property from that neighbor, on top of the shed. Of course we had no electricity, no water, no phone. For two weeks after the storm it was like camping out. It was hot and humid and it was stinky.

I see Irma coming and I do not envy the friends and neighbors who still live in our former home. Last night I had that nervous feeling in my gut, the same nervous feeling I used to get when a hurricane would come anywhere near Fort Lauderdale. Even as I laid in my bed, safe here in Chicago, I was reliving the fear of hurricanes. Sort of a hurricane PTSD. The thing is, I'll get over it. My dear friends and neighbors down in Florida will not. Probably by this time Sunday they won't even be able to read this post. I feel so helpless fourteen hundred miles away and knowing what they are going through. But if there is anything I can do from way up here in Chicago, let me know. And now I look at that hurricane track and I see that it's actually coming our way now. Damn.