I'm here in Asheville North Carolina where we're in the throes of recovery from Helene. I'm 60, and live alone, have lived alone all my life. None of us fully expected the devistation that Helene brought our mountain towns. I mean who would have thought? I too am a West Coast gal having lived here now for about 11 years. I thought a lot about your substack and the whole idea of living alone during this storm. The power was out for 3 days, I was one of the lucky ones where the power came on fairly early. And there was no damage to my house or my neighbors. But of course there was no cell service so none of us fully knew what was going on around us. No way to call or text our people. And the water service was interrupted... It still is, what, 19 days later? I've lost count. Yet I still feel so so lucky. But there was a moment there where I truly thought of your substack and being alone. It was day four and I had just a few bottles of water left, enough to get me through one more day. But then I thought, what happens next? I told my neighbors I was going to go out to get some water because I was going to run out soon. I had to give myself this pep talk though, because a part of me that always feels exhausted at having to always sort things out on my own felt particularly exhausted in this moment. The inner dialogue was just go do what you've got to do. And rumor was that water was coming into the city that day. The road in was clear and trucks and flights with water were on the way. Yay! But I drove to the distribution center only to find they were out of water before they were even supposed to open. I went home a little defeated and scared. But when I came home there was a case of water sitting on my back porch. My neighbors had left it there. I think that they thought that I had a well as they did and they decided to leave town since their power was still out. It was like Christmas. The next day things started to look up. Help showed up everywhere. It still is here thankfully. It is truly been an amazing sight to see the community pull together and help each other out. Again, I feel so lucky to still have a roof over my head and the lights on and people around who are constantly checking in on one another. But I heard so many horrible stories of elder folk being up in the mountains on their own. It has just become so immensely important to be checking on folks like the woman in your story. Literally people were going door-to-door and just checking on everybody here. I know my neighbors and I are still, again 19 some days later. None of this is easy, even when it feels like we were the luckiest. Every single person in the area has needed something at some point in time, some help. It's humbling in so many ways. But also beautiful because the thing I have learned by coming through this is that we absolutely have to be taking care of each other through the tragedy and regular old everyday life.
Stacy, thank you so much for sharing your story. I'm glad you're okay. It's good to hear about neighbor helping each other. I hope the trend catches on.
I'm here in Asheville North Carolina where we're in the throes of recovery from Helene. I'm 60, and live alone, have lived alone all my life. None of us fully expected the devistation that Helene brought our mountain towns. I mean who would have thought? I too am a West Coast gal having lived here now for about 11 years. I thought a lot about your substack and the whole idea of living alone during this storm. The power was out for 3 days, I was one of the lucky ones where the power came on fairly early. And there was no damage to my house or my neighbors. But of course there was no cell service so none of us fully knew what was going on around us. No way to call or text our people. And the water service was interrupted... It still is, what, 19 days later? I've lost count. Yet I still feel so so lucky. But there was a moment there where I truly thought of your substack and being alone. It was day four and I had just a few bottles of water left, enough to get me through one more day. But then I thought, what happens next? I told my neighbors I was going to go out to get some water because I was going to run out soon. I had to give myself this pep talk though, because a part of me that always feels exhausted at having to always sort things out on my own felt particularly exhausted in this moment. The inner dialogue was just go do what you've got to do. And rumor was that water was coming into the city that day. The road in was clear and trucks and flights with water were on the way. Yay! But I drove to the distribution center only to find they were out of water before they were even supposed to open. I went home a little defeated and scared. But when I came home there was a case of water sitting on my back porch. My neighbors had left it there. I think that they thought that I had a well as they did and they decided to leave town since their power was still out. It was like Christmas. The next day things started to look up. Help showed up everywhere. It still is here thankfully. It is truly been an amazing sight to see the community pull together and help each other out. Again, I feel so lucky to still have a roof over my head and the lights on and people around who are constantly checking in on one another. But I heard so many horrible stories of elder folk being up in the mountains on their own. It has just become so immensely important to be checking on folks like the woman in your story. Literally people were going door-to-door and just checking on everybody here. I know my neighbors and I are still, again 19 some days later. None of this is easy, even when it feels like we were the luckiest. Every single person in the area has needed something at some point in time, some help. It's humbling in so many ways. But also beautiful because the thing I have learned by coming through this is that we absolutely have to be taking care of each other through the tragedy and regular old everyday life.
Stacy, thank you so much for sharing your story. I'm glad you're okay. It's good to hear about neighbor helping each other. I hope the trend catches on.
I'm so glad that you are okay, Stacy! I was in your lovely town a week before the hurricane. I hope things get back to a more normal for you soon.