The Power of a Storm vs the Power of Friendship
It seems that everyone has a story about the storm that blew through here on Tuesday night, spawning at least four tornadoes in the greater Cleveland area. You didn’t have to drive far on Wednesday to run into closed or blocked roads, only to turn around and run into another closed road. It was like a real-life game of Pac Man (remember that one).
As I write this, three days after the storm, more than 180,000 households in the area are still without power. Some may not have it restored until Tuesday. Restaurants have had to close because their food spoiled without refrigeration. The ice rink in Mentor is closed indefinitely because they can’t keep the ice frozen, and at least a couple of area school districts have pushed back the first day of school for the season. Amazingly, our road back in the woods, where any wind brings down at least one tree and takes out the electrical service, stood tall without even a limb across the road.
What impressed me the most about what they are calling a “once-in-50-year” storm is the power of people helping friends as well as friends they haven’t met yet. Social media has been filled with offers of a place to cool off and charge devices. Giant Eagle is offering free water and ice to those without power. I even saw one person hosting a mega cookout for the neighborhood to use his freezer food before it spoiled.
It seems that as nasty and unpredictable as Mother Nature can be, she’s no match for the power of friendship.