I wake up in the morning and thank God that Mom and my sisters are safe. For the past 2 days I have been in a quandary about what I should be doing. I couldn't even talk to my family much because their cell phone batteries were low, and Mom and Kathy can't charge theirs on car batteries. This helpless feeling is reminiscent of our situation during 9/11. Our families were safe but we were miles away in Cancun, and we could only get one call out to them. They were OK and there was nothing we could or should be doing, but the need to get home was overwhelming.
The past 2 days I wanted to rush up to Washington but every time I made a plan, it did not seem like the right thing to do. We wanted to move Mom into our RV or a friend's house for a few days, but Mom absolutely refused to leave her home. According to her, everything was fine, she was just without power. That was technically true, so she felt she had facts on her side and we could not convince her otherwise. We kept thinking of bad scenarios that could happen, but she said nope, none of that was going to happen so stop worrying. Randy though we could somehow make her go, but she made it crystal clear that she was not going anywhere. Unfortunately we could not just bundle her up and push her into a car. I confess, I actually considered doing that, but her bones are so frail that it would cause a bigger disaster.
While we were considering all this, we were also listening to the information coming out of Washington. Soon the town will need a lot of outside assistance but right now they are asking people to stay away and let the First Responders do their job. The infrastructure systems are strained to the max and First Responders need a chance to get things stable (and they are doing an amazing job of it). We could drive the RV up there but there isn't a close place to plug in to keep charged (and one more unit without power would not help anyone), and we could not take a hotel room when so many local families need them. None of that would get in the way if Mom needed us, but she was perfectly happy where she was, would not move, and I couldn't find anything I actually could do for her besides drive her crazy. All that added up to staying here, saying prayers that the power would come back on, making travel plans that I could not implement, and trying unsuccessfully to not worry.
Now that my family has power restored, they can charge those cell phones! And keep safe inside their lighted, warm houses, which is so much more than many people can do right now. So my panic has receded; I can keep in touch with my family and look for the right way to contribute to the rebuild.
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