Wednesday, May 11, 2011

My City



Another significant blogging absence. I do hope that one day I will be able to resume some sort of regular posting. For now apparently I can only seem to muster up a post when something extremely significant is happening. Like right now.

My city is flooding. Like breaking all the records, water has never been this high in the history of it's existence kind of flooding.

Fortunately for myself and my family we are well out of the waters path. Unfortunately for many, including some friends and clients of mine, their residences or workplaces are not.

I have friends who are waiting to be told to evacuate their homes, and people I know well who have already had to evacuate. I feel physically ill on their behalf and have no idea how they must feel considering they are the ones whose homes are at risk.



There is also a certain feeling of claustrophobia since getting out of the city (if necessary) is becoming increasingly difficult. There have been road closures so your options are to take a significant detour or drive through the valley where an impossible amount of water is being held back by ENORMOUS sandbags stacked 3 rows high. Neither option is very appealing.



I've done a little volunteering. It's difficult because I need to have a babysitter to do it. Peter and I had a babysitter the other night and were going to help with sandbagging in a nearby rural municipality but with the logistics of getting there by way of the detour we decided against it. We didn't want to clog the road up with yet another vehicle amongst the ones who were trying to get home.

Adding insult to injury the weather has been the pits. If it's not raining it's overcast and gloomy and threatening to rain which does nothing to improve anyone's optimism or anxiety even if the rain doesn't fall.

It's as though everyone is holding their breath. Waiting to see what will happen. With an unprecedented amount of water, no one knows. And that is terrifying.

I worry about the safety of everyone working on the dikes. I worry about those who haven't been evacuated. I worry. I force myself to stop thinking about worst case scenarios when they come into my mind.

I'm thankful to be going to work today so that I can think about something else. Although, who am I kidding? I think it's a pretty safe bet what every single person who sits in my chair will talk to me about.