Finding the Good When Disaster Strikes

There’s a book called Wave, written by Sonali Deraniyagala, a survivor of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami in Indonesia that killed more than 200,000 people. She was staying at a seaside resort in Sri Lanka with her husband, two young sons, and her parents, all of whom perished when the massive, 30-foot wave struck their hotel. It’s less a book or memoir than an extended meditation chronicling the aftermath of her tragic loss and her struggles through depression, alcoholism, and suicidal ideation as she pieced her life back together.  

It took her four years to muster the courage and composure to return to the London home she had occupied with her family. One of the more poignant moments comes when lying awake in bed late one night, she notices one of her husband’s eyelashes on the pillow he slept on the last night they were together at home, a biting reminder of his death. 

Wave came to mind watching the destruction of entire towns in the wakes of Helene and Milton, as tens of thousands of people continue to suffer through the loss of property and loved ones, the debris around them a constant reminder of what they once had, now gone.  

Hurricanes suck. And here in Marco, having to prep for and endure two of them back-to-back in two weeks was exhausting.  

Talking to local friends and neighbors who rode out the storms with us, the common sentiment was twofold: we’re all grateful we dodged a couple bullets, and enduring the threat of hurricanes is the price we all pay for living in paradise.  

The latter’s a cliché, but it’s true. We all willingly signed up for a few weeks of prep, tension, power loss, and cleanup to spend the rest of the year boating, fishing, golfing, walking our beautiful beaches, and living our awesome island lifestyle here in Marco. 

Our neighborhood threw a small party two days after Milton passed to take a breath, enjoy cocktails and appetizers, and swap stories and prep tips, as we’ve done after prior storms. We all had a laugh about the guy on the news who used Flex Seal to tape up his doors and windows to keep the water out. It worked! You could see several feet of water against the glass outside, but he largely kept his house dry. A real-life MacGuyver. I ordered some Flex Seal from Amazon that day for the next storm.Hopefully, my endorsement check will be arriving soon. 

In talking to one of our neighbors, I mentioned that for me, one of the few positive impacts of going through a hurricane is how they can be a force multiplier in making you a far more present person, if only for a brief time. 

When you’re in the crosshairs of a pending hurricane, or the real threat of one, the rest of the world and its distractions literally disappear. The local news shifts to 24/7 tracking coverage for days in advance, and I personally think they do a great job here in Southwest Florida. They offer a healthy mix of science and empathy without the breathless alarmism and apocalyptic predictions that tinge much of the national media coverage of natural disasters. 

The political ads peppering our airwaves turned silly and largely irrelevant as we all focused on the more important things in life: the immediate safety and security of our families, friends, and neighbors; securing our homes and property from harm; helping our community and others recover.  

World events, wars, elections, silly and vapid pop culture news... It all just fades away. What’s happening here and now is all that matters. 

Care and concern pour in from friends and family all over the country, in some cases from people we haven’t heard from in a bit. To feel their worry from afar doesn’t increase our anxiety.Instead, it oddly reassures us we’ve got a network of folks who have our backs if and when we need it. 

Yeah. Hurricanes suck. But sometimes, it takes things that suck to make us appreciate the good we have in our lives.