Still not over quite yet

I sit here at 4am on Tuesday writing this. I'm not even sure if I will get a chance to post it since mobile phone signals are really sketchy here. I can't connect during the day too easily but at night it's a little easier. Problem is that we turn off the generator at night for a quieter evening and to avoid wasting fuel unnecessarily and I can't stay on the computer too long at night. Obviously we are still without power but a cool front moved in yesterday morning. Between having a generator and the weather cooperating, things are actually very bearable.

It's almost bizarre sitting here writing at a time of the night when there is normally extreme quiet. In some neighborhoods, it's probably quieter than normal. In ours however, all I hear is the hum of generators all around me. The only light I see is from an airplane flying overhead. It is a shame that it is overcast this evening. Normally the glow of the city lights prevents you from seeing the stars. I imagine that if there were no clouds I could see every star out there. Maybe tomorrow night we will be luckier in that respect.

I will have to say that I feel highly blessed. Many did not fare as well as my family did. We sustained no damage to our home. We did have roof damage to our Conroe rental home so we didn't come out completely unscathed from Ike. However we aren't dealing with not being able to get back to our home as the people from Galveston are. We didn't lose any loved ones either. There is no telling how many of the people who refused to leave the evacuation zones that didn't make it.

I have a list a mile long of things that I'm able to do that others are not. We are don't sit in the dark in the evenings. I have a working refrigerator and deep freeze. I watch television almost whenever I want. I can get on the internet occasionally. I can charge up my mobile phone and computer. We have running water and natural gas service. I don't know if the water is safe to drink yet but we can boil it on the stove if necessary and I have plenty of clean drinking water from before the storm as well.

I could go on and on about how blessed my family is but you get the idea. You may wonder if this is easy. The answer is no. We drove about 55 miles out of town to find a gas station with a line that was only about 45 minutes long. Around here if you can find a station open, the line is at least two hours long. Going to the grocery store poses the same problem of long lines. We stopped for supplies at a little grocery where we got gas and they were out of things like bread. It is the little things that you expect will always be there that is hard.

One would think that this of all things would trigger my anxiety issues that I often suffer from. The funny thing is that I'm about as relaxed as I've ever been in my life. Maybe it's because I've gotten to spend quality time with my husband where he isn't being constantly interrupted by a work call. Or because I haven't been to work since last Wednesday. It could be that I see on TV the people of Houston and the surrounding area are pulling together to help each other. I see that in my neighborhood as well.

It also could be recollection of being curled up in my bed listening to the worst part of that storm and feeling an unnatural calm and sense of feeling safe. Everyone else tells me how scared they were. I don't recall having that feeling at any point. I feared that a tree would come down on our house but somehow I knew that we were going to be OK anyway. I had faith that God would pull us through this and he did.