A post-hurricane glimpse of what our community could be | SEIDMAN SAYS

Carrie Seidman
·5 min read

As I write this – on my laptop attached to extension cords that snake across my lawn, under a 10-foot-high pile of storm debris, across the street and up the neighbor’s driveway to an outdoor outlet – I am on Day 10 without power following Hurricane Ian.

When it is time to send this column to my editor, I can choose to visit any one of more than a dozen friends who have offered internet service, a bed, a shower, a meal, air conditioning, a washing machine or just a shoulder as I blubber about the enormous 150-year-old banyan tree that uprooted, snapped the power line to my house and landed on my roof.

I’ve heard from countless people in my life, present and past, since the storm took aim on Florida’s west coast. Even before I evacuated -- before the lights went out; before my son’s dog (afraid to go outside) did her “business” from one end of the house to the other; before the battery-powered radio became my only link to humanity -- the dinging of incoming texts drained what battery life was left on my cell phone:

“Are you OK?”

Carrie Seidman
Carrie Seidman

My family, of course, but also people I hadn’t seen, heard from or, frankly, thought of for years. My first ballet teacher. A woman I knew so briefly I couldn’t have placed her but for her unusual name. (Samira? . . .  Samira . . . Ahhhh, Samira!). A man from Seattle I haven’t seen since we met 25 years ago when I attended his high school reunion as the “date” of a classmate. You never know how many lives you’ve touched until a hurricane knocks on your door.

Likewise, I’ve had conversations with people I see all the time but have never spoken to. Like the mysterious neighbor who’s lived behind me 11 years without appearing in daylight. There’s a couple I’ve passed on daily beach walks for a decade, with never more than a nod or a cursory “Good morning.” The day after the storm, we stopped simultaneously to share stories and exchange sympathies. She’s a nurse at the hospital; he’s not her husband (as I’d always assumed). They were so charming I felt bad I hadn’t introduced myself long ago.

People are outside more – yes, cleaning up debris, but also lingering to chat or extend favors. When I was away working, a crew came to dismantle my fallen tree and one of my neighbors kept me posted with pictorial updates – along with bolstering texts that kept me from feeling too anxious while also preparing me for the wreckage I was about to come home to.

A photo of the banyan tree that fell against Carrie Seidman's home during Hurricane Ian. The fallen tree also snapped a power line, which has left Seidman's home without electricity.
A photo of the banyan tree that fell against Carrie Seidman's home during Hurricane Ian. The fallen tree also snapped a power line, which has left Seidman's home without electricity.

Everywhere I go I hear these stories of generosity, compassion and kindness. You’d swear there was CBD in the drinking water. Instead of raging about the latest affront or irritation, people on Facebook are gushing gratitude for Florida Power & Light, putting together work crews or collecting donations. At the intersections where traffic lights are out, drivers play a game of Alphonse and Gaston in an effort to be accommodating.

Of course, I’d be less than honest if I said the storm has brought out the best in everyone.

I’m thinking of the guy next door who started using a chain saw at 5:30 a.m. Or the woman in the house behind my son’s who, as we were industriously raking up branches at 8:30 a.m. the morning after, came over to ask what we planned to do about the fallen fence – and, by the way, were we aware it was four inches over the property line? And considering the mess they left behind, it was pretty hard to think of the business that charged my insurance company $9,800 to remove my tree as "charitable."

Still, right now it seems easier to excuse – or at least forgive – the less than loving behavior, understanding that stress and trauma often surface as bad behavior and, as the old adage says, you never know what someone else is going through.

So on this 10th morning of no electricity, as I look out my kitchen window to the heaps of dead foliage and the broken fence that reveals a house I couldn’t see before, I think about what a different world it would be if we lived every day with the heightened sense of community that may be the only good thing that comes from a hurricane.

As in the days after 9/11, we come together to celebrate our survival, to grieve the losses and to support each other in the big and small ways that help us move forward. Our pain and vulnerability bury the biases –politics, gender, race and religion – that usually keep us apart. It’s sad to think it takes this kind of suffering to make us realize nothing is more important than caring for each other.

Of course, the love and unity will not last. Long before the debris has been collected or the structures rebuilt, the enmities will return. Lessons we should have learned will fade as the stories of “How I survived Ian” grow.

So just for now – for however long it lasts – let’s acknowledge and appreciate this glimpse of what Martin Luther King Jr. called “the beloved community,” understanding just what it would take to make it endure.

“Our goal is to create a beloved community," King said, "and this will require a qualitative change in our souls, as well as a quantitative change in our lives.”

Contact Carrie Seidman at carrie.seidman@gmail.com or 505-238-0392.

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Carrie Seidman: Hurricane Ian reveals Sarasota's 'beloved community'