It certainly feels like we dodged a bullet. Actually, a glimpse at how Hurricane Dorian left the Bahamas and we know it wasn’t a bullet. More like a tropical bomb. One that had been headed right for Florida. It only stopped at our doorstep and reconsidered because a timely weather system swooped down and gently nudged the hurricane on a neat, narrow path around the state.
For that, we are grateful. Dorian comes a day earlier, or that trough arrives a little late, and this is a different column. This is probably a different state. Look at the Bahamas, if you don’t believe me.
But it took so long for it all to unfold. What was it? Almost a week?
What did you do with all that time? Waiting on the world’s slowest hurricane to galumph its way up the Florida coast? Sloth-like in its calculated, slow-motion crawl. So close to St. Augustine that it was agonizing and terrifying. Yet, just far enough away that some incredibly powerful computers, and the meteorologists who call them friends, said it would keep the winds and waters out.
And we believed them. Thank goodness they were right.
But it was so much time. Time to prepare and make sure we were ready. And then time to sit down and stare endlessly at a stream of information coming out of TVs and phones and weather maps and Hurricane Center forecasts.
Where would it go? Was it wobbling? Was it on course? Were they right?
And the mind wanders, doesn’t it? Mine to a colleague who texted about eating MREs. Meals-Ready-to-Eat. Pre-packaged military meals with little packets of coffee and snacks and other goodies that tantalize the boy in me. He had a box of them. I was jealous. I had some cold pizza and a can of boiled chicken.
To the sermon of Pastor Hunter Camp, delivered at historic Memorial Presbyterian in downtown St. Augustine the Sunday before it all started to happen. When we still weren’t sure if the waters would come here, or if the cross on that precious dome might come down again. He said to let go of your worries. That our “stuff” was just that: replaceable stuff. To trust that it would all work out. And to be patient with one another. It was cathartic, and just what I needed to hear.
To the feelings of disappointment after Dorian passed. Is that what it was?!? Could it possibly be? Human nature, I suspect. Did you feel it, too? That we had worked so hard and prepared and done everything we could to make sure we were ready. And for what? The hurricane barely tested us.
It’s silly, isn’t it? This feeling of post-storm “letdown.” Thinking maybe the prepping wasn’t all necessary.
But, of course, it was. Look at the Bahamas.
I remind myself that the point of getting ready – of being prepared – isn’t to actually brave the worst. It’s to be ready, and then hope the worst never comes at all. Not to see if we can live up to the test, but to ultimately dodge it.
And my thoughts ultimately drifted to the people in the Bahamas. How a storm stalling out on top of them meant that we can be here thinking these things in the comfort of our unscathed homes. That our good fortune is a byproduct of their misfortune. That had it not stopped there, it would have inevitably stopped here. For that, we are grateful. But that’s also why I’ll be making a donation to help the Bahamas. Because I know just how close it was to being us.