Road's open
Peter was able to go back to work on Monday and we braved Santa Rosa to prepare for the insurance adjuster who was coming on Tuesday. Whew, it was really weird being out in the world.
Really hard rubbing up against people as if everything was normal. I mean we have so little idea how loaded a question is how are you. Like a gun, like a provocation, like you wanna fight man. I can't begin to tell you. It's strange.
The last time I had a run in with this was when all the answers were secret. That is to say, I couldn't say, because everything I would have had to say was a confidence. The difference was at that time it had simply reduced me to hysterical laughter accompanied by that blank stare I am sometimes known to give when asked what I consider to be a stupid question. Oh well.
Paul and I went back to work on Wednesday the 18th.
And the inevitable happened, Hi Judi how are you? you know, head cocked to the side with concern. And I just looked at the bitch, in a manner of speaking only, with that blank look I get when someone asks me what I consider to be a stupid question--which fortunately was familiar to her--and blessedly she went on to say, or is that a stupid question? Whew.
Cleaning.
It was something seeing the inside of everyone's house outside. Innards lined the roads everywhere you travelled; stoves fridges bookcases books insulation walls countertops flooring floors washing machines dryers vanities entertainment centers TV's stereos dressers beds sofas desks miles and miles of carpets and carpet pads cabinets power tools water heaters toys, you name it. And of course, scalvagers, as we called them. Those with integrity at least came to the door and asked before they rifled through your belongings.
It was demoralizing, and thankfully the county had arranged for the conservation corps, incarcerated juveniles, to be part of a clean up crew. It was good, they came for days with bigfront loaders and dumpsters and made hash of our belongings pretty damned fast, but at least the piles were gone.
This was one of those sound and color things all rolled into one, it's still pouring rain and everywhere is gray except for the yellow front loaders and dumpsters of different colors. Front loaders all up and down the street for days going forward and crunching piles of furniture and household goods and going backwards and beeping and loading people's crumpled goods into dumpsters all up and down the street. Forward and crush and backward and load. Crush and load. And the sounds of the stuff being crunched, I don't know, it almost made you think of bones. And that Godforsaken front loader beeping had replaced the helicopters as a signal of our distress. Our driveway out front parks six cars easy and we filled it up three times with stuff to be smashed and loaded. That was hard. That was one of the times I got into oh, there's that oak desk we bought, you know for only $125 when we first got to San Francisco, and the mahogany dresser we refinished, it had been painted an ugly slime green, and the leather couch, and the stove and fridge and two washing machines and the dryer and all that stereo equipment and the tools, ach the tools, and the books, oh the books. My life's worth of books...anyway zip zap, crunched, crumpled, smashed and loaded and gone. Leila and Paul somehow both compelled to watch had sent me away, an atrocity not to witness it was.
Mud, mildew, mould and green slime. Hoses.
You went, I went into my empty house, with hoses and shovels and squeegees and hosed the damned things out. Weird. You can't even begin to imagine how much mud there was. Raw sewage, hell of way to fertilize the garden. The Red Cross gave out cleaning kits and hot meals. Spaghetti and bleach. What a combo. And you, we cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and there was and is still mud everywhere you look.
In an effort to battle the mildew, they brought blowers and suckers and foggers and dehumidifiers and desiccators and fans. They blasted the house with disinfectant and then for days with mondo fans, and lots of them they dried out the house.
Brings up questions of electricity and water, yes. And phone connections yes and propane tanks. And mail, neither rain nor sleet nor snow nor hail, but they never said nothin' about high water, now did they. Anyway all things which needed minding. First guy in was the electrician, power. Now, this was a frightening concept. When the power came back on in the neighborhood, we excitedly went back to the house, to flip the main switch only to discover that the meter was more than half full of water. We called the electric company (PG&E) to report this and asked them to come check it out before we turned the power on. Good thinking they said. So they came and checked it out and turned the power on! Oh well. On the grid for free. Not bad in the end, especially since the house didn't short out and we used more power during the four days it took to dry out the house than we probably use in 6 months. Stupid suckers.
Well, needless to say we redid the breaker box and all the plugs in the house since they'd all been under water, and PG&E did finally get their shit together and redo the meter. And the phone guys redid the phone connections. And even though we had secured our propane tank so that it hadn't floated away, it had upended, and then we decided to switch to a propane, on demand hot water heater, so we needed a new and bigger tank anyway.
So now at least with the basics we were back online, as it were.
There was a point finally where the destruction did stop and construction did begin. There came a point where order began to hold its own in the face of all the chaos and where families did regain a sense of integrity. And the prospect of peace begins to ride herd on the potential for violence. It had been an edge experience and we were all but for the grace of one another, just a hair's breadth from the edge of destruction. All of us, each with our own demon called upon to do battle, to take a stand to make that irrevocable decision. More than once.
And so people ask, are you going to move and Paul looks on with wonder saying where, meaning of course, where might one go where safety can be guaranteed? And I think, one does not desert at the first sign of difficulty, and I remember the inimitable Super Chicken who always said you knew the job was dangerous when you took it Fred. And so of course the answer is no. But it is like one of those in the hole kind of things. You always can. It allows for some sense of maneuvering room when it seems like there is none afforded you elsewhere. Like when the insurance man and mortgage man and every other Tom Dick and Harry who thinks he needs a part of this, starts in. You know like the county inspectors and the engineers and the FEMA people and on and on and on. It is sometimes endless and you begin to know more about things you never wanted to know about in the first place. Oh well.
