So – you probably heard – that hurricane I typed so lightly about struck. In fact it hit Ulster County where I am hardest of all apparently. Everywhere you go there are power cables skirting the roads and collapsed trees obstructing pretty much everything. I was surprised at how uneventful it all seemed – from my bed. I’m from England so I’m used to pretty torrential rain all night and wind. But when I finally got out of my bed (after I realised our power was gone, and therefore our water supply) and left the house I realised it was pretty bad as I waded through water on our lane and saw pretty much everyone having to pump water out of their drowned cellars.
We were without power for two days then miraculously it came back on again, just as we fixed our generator. The rest of the town however had no power and everyone was evacuated as it looked like the river would burst its banks. It didn’t but it was close, and just outside the town, part of the road over the river collapsed due to the excessive water. General devastation everywhere. Then just as we were feeling a little smug (and comparatively scrubbed up) I sat on the studio balcony on the phone and watched a tree collapse onto our electricity cables and transformer. The problem of living in a wood. The whole thing began popping and exploding everywhere and then went up in flames. Once again no power. And it continues. Hence no posts to Sketchbook. Internet seems to be down altogether, no way to charge all our toys, and I’ve had to come to another town to write this.
Still I can’t think of better people to be enjoying it with. Lots of baking by candlelight, barbeques and jam making as people clear out their fast melting freezers, and lake swimming as a means to have a bath. The only real problem is that no power and water for almost a week now also means very little progress on my publication. This is somewhat worrying.
I've scheduled some posts over the coming week to show you what's happening here, keep looking! And apologies all who have emailed and who I'm yet to respond to. I will - but at the moment I'm on a laptop with low charge nicking free wifi in a cafe…
