Two hurricanes in two weeks. . .in eastern Pennsylvania??
OK. I know we didn’t get what one would typically call a hurricane with destructive winds over 100 mph, an an eye in the center, and torrential rain. But where I live in eastern Pennsylvania Hurricane IDA was enough of a hurricane to fill our rain gauge to overflowing (officially 8+ inches of rain) and damaging winds that left branches strewn about our yard.
But we were lucky. My nephew two counties away had hip deep flooding in his basement that swamped the efforts of three pumps and destroyed wiring, drywall, furniture and carpeting. Near his house — within 40 miles in different directions — three different tornadoes touched down and destroyed houses and life dreams of many families.
IDA delivered her deluge in our town on top of ground soaked to the limit by Hurricane/Tropical Storm Fred the week prior. A sponge that is full cannot take on additional water and only sheds the new torrent. And so it did.
If only we could persuade such superabundance of rain to go west and drench Lake Powell, put out the fires so delirious at the prospect of devouring dead pines and lived-in houses whose owners, like the ones not far from my nephew’s, had dreams for their futures that are now ash.
Today’s blue cloudless skies deny the whirlwind that filled yesterday with untamed winds and water that refused to comply with streams or drainage ponds. All summer here in eastern PA we longed for, prayed for, watched anxiously for rain that would soften and penetrate the baked clay soil that was my vegetable garden. Strawberries and raspberries fruited in profusion until mid-June when clouds no longer yielded more than thunder. Watering seeds and tiny plantlets with a hose was a futile gesture of spiritless hope without supplemental raindrops every week or two.
I suspect it is one more changing cycle born of climate change and an abundance of CO2. Spring showers . . . then drought for two summer months then . . . (dare I name it?) hurricane season in the northeast. Still, I know my family is lucky to have blue sky above, a dry house, electric power, an abundance of tiny yellow sugary tomatoes, and a cat that sleeps soundly once the torrent ceases.
Pilgrimages and Paths 