My mom keeps calling, wanting updates, and bless her heart, I’m about ready to tell her to just fucking read the blog, because, god damn it, my conversations with her are excruciating. She’s clearly concerned, but her concern is just grueling. People, she faxed me a children’s book about a flood, because she thought I would appreciate it. I repeat, she faxed the contents of a whole book to me at work. For an hour the fax machine was busy printing out a whole damn book.
And tonight she called for an update, which is fine, but she’s trying so hard to be chipper and she wants to hear all about things, but in this chipper way, like there’s some way to talk about this as a list of facts, of what’s been destroyed and what hasn’t. She called to ask if we still have water and I didn’t know if she meant in the yard or in our creek or what. And she said my Aunt. B. had heard that the Opryland Hotel was flooded so Mom asked about the mall. I said the mall was flooded, too. And she was all, “Well, it’s right by the river. It’s right by the river.” and I just wanted to scream about how every god damn thing here is right by a river when every creek is acting like a river and every river is flooding.
And then she asked again about our yard. And I explained again that our yard is mostly fine. And she says, “Oops, too bad for folks down stream.”
And I just have to get off the phone, as fast as I can because all I can think about are the people dying in their homes on Hummingbird and West Hamilton while my mulch and plants and crumbles of my driveway and the lid to our cooler swirled around them. And I know it’s nothing we did. And I know in real life the likelihood of our crap being there when they died is slim and none.
And during the day, I’m all “Nashville, fuck yeah!” and I a so proud of everyone, except those fuckers still watering their lawns or washing their cars, but at night, it’s hard.
I know we didn’t do anything wrong. But I feel so terrible. It’s not guilt, exactly. But why my day should be spent wondering how we’re going to repair the driveway and why their day should be spent in the cold, dry silence of death, it’s just not clear. I mean, it is clear. I was lucky. I live near a small stream. Whites Creek doesn’t make a right turn right by my house. There are a lot of reasons. None of them soothe me.
It’s not just gossip for me, I guess is what I’m trying to say. So, it makes these phone calls terrible.
And, yeah, the driveway is just fucking wrecked. And I’m not sure what we can do to patch it. I’m a wreck. I can’t even think rationally about it. And I feel bad for being a wreck. I need to make a list. I just need to make a list and then plod through my list, cling to my list like a guide wire, just following it without thinking.
It took me over an hour to get home from work. It usually takes twenty minutes.
I’m just babbling now, but the sound of my fingers on the keys makes me feel better.
Tiny Cat Pants 