I take back my words

today we finally got back power after 11 days without it. I said that I was not afraid of wilma, well at 7am when I heard the wind shreiking and howling like a misplaced soul, I was scared. I took a peek under the door and I saw huge trees bowing before wilma's wrath. I could not believe it , wilma had chosen the path less taken. the lights started to flicker in the house and the doors were shaking almost as if the wind wanted to pull them out and grab me from inside the house. then there was darkness. I lay flat on the cold floor looking under the door at the raving wind that seemed determined to destroy everything in its path. there was huge flashes of lights and loud explosions as transformers blew and power lines were ripped down. There was not much rain to accompany this storm rain because the wind was so feirce as fast that it blew the rain away. I took a chance and opened my room door and was greeted with horror to see my beautiful mango tree broken and beaten down in front of my door. there was howling and then suddenly a calm pervaded the air. I was tempted to run outside to assess the damage but we stayed indoors as everyone around the house pitter pattered around nervously. then like a maddened fiend the howling started again, this time more fiercly, the doors started to shake so much, I placed my hand against the glass sliding doors and I swore that they would explode and second. there was awrenching as my room door shattered and then the screen got ripped off. i swore that a tornado was whirling around the house. This kept one for a couple hours and I stayed inside considering the fury that was spinning wrecklessly outside, yet somehow I knew that it would be okay. I knew that nature was furious but I felt her comfort as well...I knew this as soon as I stepped outside, the wind was still blowing strongly, but this time it was more caressing ans instead of shreiking , it was now whispering gently. I smiled brightly because everyone was safe and no one had been hurt. the trees were broken but the wind was kind enough to not uproot any of them, all the trees could now be salvaged. I took a walk around around the neighbourhood and realised with glee that we had just survived a hurricane!

Now cleanup:
that day we did not have any power tools except our own strength. my dad started chopping away at the huge branches of the mango tree that had fallen and my brother, sister and I formed a human chain and cleaned up the debris. the first cold front of the season had come in with the storm and we worked like bysons removing the debris from the yard, proud to realise that we co-operated as a family and got the job done.

One thing that diasasters bring is a sense of brotherhood amongst people. what I saw from this was a kindness eminating from every man woman and child as they did not even consider their own misfortune but struggled to see in what way they could help their neighbour, brother, family.
In this storm it gave a lot of people a break from an otherwise hectic life filled with the annoyances of technology, internet and TV, in that now a family sat down together and talked, laughed, ate, worked. families that were estranged moved in with each other and bonds became tighter.
there is so much that I want to say but I do not know if I am capable of expressing the emotions and atmosphere after the storm. it is as if life stopped for a while and we were thrown back a couple centuries and cities became villages and neighbours finally met each other and spoke for the first time. I did the laundry by hand and I enjoyed it actually. I got up at daybreak and slept at dawn because there was no internet or TV to occupy my time. there was an atmosphere of calm in the air as people stopped bustling about. there was a thick cloud of love in the air and think that everyone frlt it.
two doggies came into yard, they were so beautiful, one wasblack and the other brown. the poor things were hungry and I tried to feed them a cookie but they seemed more interested in the parsad that my mom had thrown under a tree earlier that morning. the doggies stayed and played a while and drank water then went on their merry way.
I would like to think that I learned a lot from this storm and I love florida even with the hurricanes, because the people are so warm here...