Surviving Sandy: A Refugee's Diary

Sunday
Ed, recovering from his half-Ironman (more on that later), found a text message on his phone from his cousin, a travel agent who'd booked our plane tickets for us. "Your flight has been cancelled," he told me. "What?" I spluttered. This seemed ridiculous, as the hurricane wasn't predicted to get really bad until Tuesday morning. I'd thought for sure that my Sunday night flight would land with no problems. Ed, who was scheduled to fly out of Austin on Monday, presented a bigger problem in my mind, though it seemed now that both of us were stuck. Ed's cousin emailed a bit later to say that he'd gotten me on a Tuesday flight, but that he was not optimistic about its odds of taking off. Oh dear. I texted my office manager to let him know, and turned my attentions to taking care of Ed, who was wiped out after his race.

Monday
We checked out of our hotel in Austin and drove the rental car to San Antonio to stay in Ed's mom's house; she was traveling and so not there to greet us, but we were happy to have a free place to wait out the far-off storm. We settled in and I used Ed's laptop to do a bit of work by the pool. Not a bad trade for the office. Later, we went to Ed's friend's house, where we watched CNN and the Weather Channel, gasping at the images of our familiar running trail under water and a building in our neighborhood whose facade had fallen off. It was tough to see in the dark, but the flooding seemed terrible enough that I worried about our apartment. Our building was in the zone least likely to flood (apparently), but I was still anxious, particularly since we're on the first floor and our bedroom is in the basement. My friend Jenny texted me to say they'd cut her power. I was torn between being glad to be stuck where I was and wishing I were home, though I reasoned that I wouldn't be able to stop the flood waters if they did get to our building.

Tuesday
We were not surprised to learn that my Tuesday flight had been cancelled. Ed's cousin emailed to say he'd gotten me onto a Wednesday flight - he was pessimistic about this one, too - and had gotten Ed a spot on a Friday flight. I was scheduled to fly into Newark, which seemed to have sustained the least damage of the three airports that service New York City, but Ed was scheduled to land at JFK where the flooding was much worse. A seat on my plane would set Ed back $1,000, too much, we decided, for two days. We brought breakfast back to the house and watched the morning news for more information the storm. Lots of the floodwaters had receded, but the suspension of subway service was a sobering prospect. Nearly everyone in the city depends on the subway, and even the people with cars were supposed to stay off the roads to allow the clean-up and repair crews to do their jobs. The lower part of Manhattan, as well as lots of town in New Jersey and Long Island had no power or gas (and therefore no heat). We switched off the TV after too much bad news. I read for a while, then went for a tempo run while Ed did a conference call. Later, we went out for dinner at a nice restaurant Ed's mom had recommended. I was starting to feel very lucky to be stranded in Texas. I'd enjoyed a hot shower that day, and was now eating in a restaurant that had a working fridge, gas for the stove and oven, and staff members who were able to get to work easily. Few people in Manhattan would be able to say the same, I reasoned.

Wednesday
My Wednesday flight was cancelled as well, not surprisingly. Ed's cousin got me on one for Thursday, and we settled in to wait for word that this one, too, was cancelled. To pass the time, we went shopping, visited the zoo, then picked up lots of cash, a solar cell phone charger, batteries for Ed's camping lantern, and candles for me to take back to the city with me. I reasoned that all of these things would be in short supply. We met a friend of Ed's for dinner that night, and still had not heard any news from Ed's cousin, meaning that my flight seemed to be on.

Thursday

The red text says "cancelled".

Ed gallantly drove me to the airport at 3:30 in the morning in time for my 6:00 flight. I thought the plane would be overflowing with other stranded New Yorkers, but there were quite a few empty seats and most of the accents I heard were gentle drawls instead of the harsher tones of my fair city; I guess Austin isn't a very popular destination for New Yorkers. We landed in Newark without incident. The airport was emptier than I'd ever seen it, and a glance at the departures screens told me why - it seemed that about a third of the scheduled flights were cancelled.

I was worried about getting into the city without the aid of a train, figuring cabs would be few and far between. I ended up taking a $16 shuttle to Port Authority - it was cheap and quick. The subways had opened but weren't going below 34th Street, so I hailed a cab without difficulty to take me the rest of the way home. I knew my office on 29th was open and had power, so I was hopeful that my apartment might, too, as we drove down 7th Avenue. My hopes dissolved, however, as we crossed 25th Street and I saw that the stoplights were suddenly dark and every storefront was shuttered. Upon seeing me, our doorman produced a flashlight and used it to escort me to my apartment because the hallway, windowless, was pitch black. Glow sticks lined the edges of the floor and had been hung on each door, but they were losing their luminescence. Things inside the apartment looked pretty normal, to my relief. I put on my headlamp and set about unloading the candles, putting the batteries into the lantern, and tidying up and unpacking while I had daylight remained; all that stuff would be difficult to do in the dark later. My work ethic halted when it came to the fridge, however; it had sat without power for more than three days and I decided I'd had enough for one day.

Venturing through the wilds of the bathroom

I dressed for work and headed out the door. In the lobby of the building, two mail carriers were chatting about how many hours earlier than usual they'd had to get up to make it to work. I was grateful that the efforts of people like them, who were willing to rise early and work late, were slowly but surely restoring the city. I heard later that workers were scrubbing the subway tracks and rails by hand to get the salt off so that the trains could run again; THAT'S dedication. Outside, policemen in bright yellow jackets took the place of working stoplights, not a single store was open for blocks, and the sidewalks were covered with leaves and debris; I guess business owners are responsible for clearing the areas in front of their shops.

I didn't see too much in the way of large pieces of debris, but one huge tree seemed to have simply snapped just above the ground; it was amazing to think that the winds had been strong enough to topple it. Clearly, efforts had been made to trim off the lighter parts of it, but the huge trunk still lay on the sidewalk, wrapped in yellow tape, awaiting removal. I snapped a picture and kept walking and suddenly I was back in the city I know. I'd reached 25th Street where the power had been restored and everything was up and running as though nothing had ever happened. People were drinking coffee in Starbucks and paying cashiers with credit cards at Duane Reade. What a weird transition. I put in a few hours at the office, most of which were spent talking to my co-workers about their storm experiences. Our office manager's trip to our building from his home in Brooklyn had taken him three hours that morning: 90 minutes of standing in line and 90 minutes on a bus standing in for the subway that, without traffic, could have arrived in Manhattan in just 15.


I made arrangements to stop by my friend Jeremy's apartment after I picked up my number from the marathon expo. He lives just blocks from the convention center so I could walk there without having to worry about whether the subway was running or not, and his apartment is far enough north (41st Street) that their power had never been disconnected in the first place. He said they were largely unaffected by the storm, and I glowered. I was soon joined by two other refugees, residents of Chinatown, who were also without power, and we all showered and it was wonderful. Some of Jeremy's roommates showed up with yet another homeless New Yorker; he said he'd been couch surfing for four days and was quite cheerful about his transience. I hung around to watch TV and eat take-out Thai food in a well lit, warm apartment for a few hours, then ventured back to my own place at about 10:30. My cabbie drove carefully through the dark streets. It felt scary, somehow, seeing the familiar streets turning alien without the streetlights and lit restaurants and storefronts. My friend Nick once wrote a poem with a line in it about how there's more to dark than just the absence of light, and I can whole-heartedly agree with him after last night. Beyond spookiness, though, it was downright dangerous to be in some of the outer boroughs without streetlights; stories about muggings and lootings abounded. In Chelsea, though, I had no cause to worry about such things. I was dropped off in front of my building without incident and fired up the headlamp and lantern as soon as I was through the door. I'd gotten in late enough that there was little to do but get into bed, which was fortunate because I'm not sure what else I could have done. The cats settled in around me to keep me warm. I switched off the headlamp and reflected that I couldn't remember when I'd last been in such total darkness. There wasn't even a digital clock to break it. Not conducive to living, but very conducive to sleeping. ConEd had promised to have the whole island connected by Saturday night, and I drifted off to sleep with high hopes that they'd surpass their estimation.