The last month has not been easy... In fact the last 3 weekends have been quite traumatic to say the least. It all started with a little earthquake. New York? Earthquake? I thought that was impossible. Apparently it's not, and apparently New Yorkers are not prepared. Phones stopped working, people lined the streets of fifth avenue as they evacuated their buildings, and it was the talk of the day.
Part One: A Roach & Irene
The weekend slowly approaches. I get an email from my manager telling me to bring the deck furniture into our office Friday before "the storm". Nate asks me if I live in an "evacuation zone" and the weather channel is playing everywhere I look. Friday approaches, my roommate leaves for the weekend, and as the day goes on the city becomes more and more anxious. The drug stores are filled with swarms of people buying crate after crate of bottled water, flashlights, batteries, and candles. Everywhere I walk IRENE seems to be the word on everyone's lips. I don't buy into the hysteria. In fact I think everyone is being a little silly and should take a deep breath and CALM down.
As I leave work in Soho that day I see all of the store windows being boarded up, floor to ceiling, closed until the storm passes. All YogaWorks studios are closed and I'm told I should "tape" up my windows so if they break they won't shatter into a million pieces. I should also fill my bathtub with water in case the water goes out. My flashlight is out of batteries...but they're already sold out everywhere by now. Oh, and the trains, buses, subways will go into full shut-down mode the next day at noon, leaving me stranded in Brooklyn.
So I buy some candles, 1 bottle of water, and a glow-in-the-dark bouncy ball in case the power goes out for Pumpkin. On my way home I buy 2 new books for Teacher Training and a brand new beautiful journal. I am ready for a quiet weekend alone in Brooklyn with my Pup. It's going to be OK. In fact, it will probably be relaxing!
I get home and quickly take Pumpkin out. Nothing in the world could have prepared me for what I see next. On my freshly painted kitchen wall, right above our stove, I see the biggest, crunchiest, whiskery cockroach. Roughly as long as my entire palm smack on the wall.
The hours that followed were some of the more stressful, panic-stricken hours of my life. I tried to crush the bastard with a frying pan- and missed! He proceeded to scurry, SO FAST, all around my kitchen, and I literally screamed and cried, summing up the courage to smack him dead. I failed. And after 5 minutes of watching him run through my sink, counters, and fridge, he escaped under the stove.
I stood there, in my big boots, literally covered in sweat and tears, hysterical waiting for him to come out. I waited and waited. And cried. And missed Nate more than I think I ever have in my life. He was on a boat somewhere. Not that it even matters where he is anymore, since it's not with me and that's pretty much all I care about these days.
3 phone calls to exterminators who don't do house calls for under $300 past 11:00pm later, I barricaded myself in my room, bathrobe shoved under the door (which is still there, by the way!), refused to drink water with fear that I may have to wake up in the middle of the night and have him crawl over my feet in the dark of my apartment. PRAYING that the power doesn't go out so I don't have to be stuck alone in Brooklyn in my apartment in the DARK with a GIANT ROACH!
It was then that I went online and saw an exaggerated article on "What NYC could look like on Sunday". It was pictures from the movie 2012, where the entire city is destroyed and underwater. It was in that moment that I realized I was alone, it was too late to leave, and I should maybe start taking this thing seriously. That in combination with the roach and I had been thrown over the edge. The night that followed was a mess.
So I road to home depot the next day, and bought $40 worth of every trap, poison, bait, and spray known to kill roaches amongst the hundreds of panicked New Yorkers shoveling candles, batteries, and duct tape into their carts.
The storm past. We survived. And of course, it wasn't as bad as everyone had anticipated. The giant tree in my backyard did fall, but luckily not on my window.
Part Two: A 3am Kidnapping
The week passed, my roommate came home, and the city slowly recovered. That weekend, after my roommate broke up with her long term military boyfriend, we decided to go to her parent's house in Rochester, NY. We rented a car and drove 6 hours to a home. It was lovely. So lovely that we procrastinated leaving so much that we didn't pull into the New York area on Monday morning until 2:30am, after it poured rain for the entire 6 hours back, 2 accidental evaded tolls later and my phone, our only source of navigation, was dead. We tried to figure out our way through the Brooklyn highways by ourselves when all of a sudden we saw a car slow on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. I say "Kathleen, slow down - that car is stopped". We slow down, look to the side as we pass the car and we see a woman outside of her car on the highway, screaming and crying in terror with her arms splayed our trying to get help. Around her waste a man grabbed her and tried to get control over her. She looked right at me with a face that I can only describe as terror and desperation. I was sure she was being kidnapped. I quickly said "pull over! call 911". We did. And slowly more and more cars stopped until there was a small traffic jam. We told the police everything as we sat on the side of the highway looking back. Then all the cars began moving again and the woman was gone. As we got off the highway at the next exit we saw a police car enter.
This was the scariest thing I've ever witnessed in my life. We got back to our barren Brooklyn street at 3:00am shaking and speechless. We were terrified and so worried for this woman. We entered our dark empty apartment where the roach had been just a week before. We unpacked and showered but couldn't get the image of this woman's face out of our minds. I felt like I had PTSD because the image and the sounds kept replaying over and over in my mind. I felt like I was going to throw up and barely slept that night. When I did sleep I dreamt I had to save her and kept hearing police sirens outside my window.
I have since tried to repress this night. We did everything we could, I keep telling myself.
Part Three: 9/11
The third weekend brings me to today. The 10th anniversary of 9/11. I could not imagine what it would have been like to live here when it happened 10 years ago. The fact that there was evidence of a planned attack for today scares me, infuriates me, and saddens me. The world we live in is so sad. How do people have such anger and hatred in their hearts? And more importantly, how can people kill thousands of people in the name of God?
I think God is sitting up there so disappointed by how off-mark we all are down here.
It's been a pretty brutal few weeks, let me tell you! With all the things that have happened it almost feels like God is trying to tell me to leave NY, or at least convince me that when I do leave, whenever that may be, it will be time. I feel like I am not cut out for this single girl roughing it in the city life. Feminist in me be damned, but I need a man! I'm ready for this chapter of my life to start wrapping up. Next weekend I get to see Nate for the first time in over a month for 12 hours before he officially leaves for California. I don't know if it's just me, but life has gotten a lot harder and A LOT scarier since he left.
