Where to Start?

Just another couple of hum drum days down here at  Cedar Point.  Nothing really big to report. Just the same old same old.

You might have heard that I had a few guests.  I remembered some of them.  Others were new to me. Some lived close by and others were on a trip. When I heard that the Stones were coming, my first thought was of  Keith and Mick. After that, Fred and Barney. I.F. Stone was a journalist whose work I use in my class. None of them came. Instead I got a lot of return visits from the stones I threw back on the beach after Sandy.  I am starting to be on a first name basis with a few. I swear I recognize them like you might recognize a donated piece of clothing you see someone wearing later on.

This is one of many morning after shots. 

(Remember that you can click on the pictures to make them bigger)

I have been trying to figure out how to tell this story best and I have not really arrived at an answer.  I am grateful to say that this mess has already been cleaned up. Russ Totman and his son Russell arrived this morning to rebuild the seawall and pull all this stone back to the beach from which it came.  They have done a phenomenal job. No one, I mean, no one, knows the wall and the revetment and the tide and the over wash like Russ Totman, and I am so grateful that he was given the call to reestablish some protection for this point. He knows where stuff needs to go and knows the neighbors to get permission to put it there.  Everyone wins when the right man for the job, gets the job.

There was only one real threat to the building and that was the massive amount of rock thrown at the shed and at the runway.  The Tower is a marvel of engineering and seemingly wasn't even scratched.  The cottage was threatened for a brief time by the storm surge but was not damaged at all. When I posted that there was no need to worry, I had some experience on my side.

The No Name storm of October 91 was far longer and did a different kind of damage.  The Blizzard of 78 had a great deal more snow and all the travel headaches.  It also pushed the whole of Sand Hills, Egypt, Minot, and Peggotty Beaches into the road with the snow. The problem with this storm was the loss of power in cold temperatures and the dangers that emerge when water and electricity mix. Pipes broke in several spots causing a ceiling to let go and the loss of some furniture, books, electronics, and the other this and that you find in a house under a bed in a box suddenly full of water.  That too has been addressed in part.

Thanks go out to Servicemaster of Scituate who had a team here to get the rest of the ceiling out before it fell and gave the room a scrub for good measure. Mr. Fryling and his crew was spectacular and put this old light keeper at ease in the midst of a morning with more questions than answers. Thanks too are due to Tom Galligan Plumbing for finding a way to get here and get us back in place so quickly. I have been making a great number of lists in the past few days and one is of things that are not in any way overrated. Very near the top: Hot water. Eamon got us there and more, in a hard days work which included my haunting him with a raft of questions. I learned a lot and got clean and warm. Not small things.

Still a way to go as most of the first floor is in some kind of chaos.  One room smells like there are 20 wet St. Bernards in it. Another has more books in it than you would see at the Harvard Coop. One has seating for 12 in a space for 6. Today was a day to start to rationalize that mess so that we can live here without a constantly stubbed toe.  I also threw more than 400 stones out of the yard. If John Lester doesn't throw 250 innings, I will question his stamina after the workout I threw today.

Come on back for the storm story that I will try to tell with some cool photos.  I don't really have the pieces in place yet. There was a noise that I would have loved to find a way to record as that will probably be the thing I remember most.  I will work on a way to describe that and get back to this another day. 

I will leave you with a shot I got that was suggested by our friend Nancy Fay. Nancy hosted the family during the coldest stretch and we will never know better company. It was a house of blankets and firelight and books read by flashlight.  You wouldn't wish for another storm but you wouldn't dread it if you knew you could have those comforts again.