2022 Comes Roaring in Like a Hurricane

I lay awake in bed last night listening to the wind push, pull, and tear at everything in its path. It had already toppled the garbage and compost bins, upended the chair and table on the deck and torn the hot tub cover half off. I had gone outside in my nightgown and new slippers trying to fasten it back down, but the wind had no respect for skinny leather straps. I looked around at the writhing trees and said, “God, it’s in your hands now.” 

Just getting comfortable under the covers, I heard another bang. From the window, I could see the exposed lights of the control panel on the spa. I decided there was nothing I could do alone in the dark. I was just a small thing, an ant in a big world gone out of control. I could only tuck myself into my blankets and clean sheets and hope for the best. I thought of the people in Kentucky whose houses were demolished by tornadoes, the people in Colorado who lost their homes to fire, and the folks in New Orleans whose homes were flooded out by Hurricane Katrina. This wasn’t as bad as that, was it?

I felt like the little pig who built his house out of wood, easy for the Big Bad Wolf to huff and puff and blow it down. Go away, Big Bad Wolf!

I woke up at 5 a.m. and switched the radio on to hear the news. Nothing but hissing. Apparently the wind took out the local NPR station. I flexed my arthritic hands and feet. Time to get up and assess the damage. 

The dog was asleep on the couch, the plastic on the protective cone around her neck shining in the Christmas tree lights. There are times when it’s handy that she can’t hear. I opened the door and went out into the wind and rain. The hot tub cover was completely off. In the dark, I couldn’t see where it was. It’s heavy. I will need help to get it back on. But it was nothing for the wind. I could see no other destruction, but it was dark and would be dark for another two hours. I went back in, poured my juice and turned on my computer. 

I thought a lot last night about wind. What is it? It’s just air. We can’t see wind; we can only see its effects, the moving branches, the swinging wind chimes, the shingles torn off the roof, the hot tub cover thrown across the lawn. What is wind? What makes wind? 

I found a great article from the National Geographic Society. It’s designed for junior high and high school students, but I’m still struggling to understand it. “Wind,” it says, “is the movement of air caused by the uneven heating of the Earth by the sun.” Okay . . . 

Then there’s this: “Differences in atmospheric pressure generate winds. At the Equator, the sun warms the water and land more than it does the rest of the globe. Warm equatorial air rises higher into the atmosphere and migrates toward the poles. This is a low-pressure system. At the same time, cooler, denser air moves over Earth’s surface toward the Equator to replace the heated air. This is a high-pressure system. Winds generally blow from high-pressure areas to low-pressure areas.”

Now they’ve lost me. But it’s a swell article with details about things like prevailing winds, the Coriolis effect, jet streams, storm fronts (no storm backs?), and nor’easters. What do you call what we had last night? I’m going to wait for the news to come back on to explain it to my poet brain. I just know it blew hella strong and knocked stuff over. Come daylight, I’ll assess the damage. At least, my house seems to be still standing, and the deaf dog slept through it all. 

Dawn: Aha.The hot tub cover blew all the way up against the fence. Even the dog is impressed. No reception on the country music radio station either, but newslincolncounty.com tells of power lines down, streets blocked by trees, and a general mess caused by last night’s southerly wind. 

They say March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. It looks like 2022 has come in like Godzilla, and we don’t know what’s next. 

Remember last week’s playful post about how the weather is a never-ending show? Well, we had more than 12 inches of rain in December, we had serious snow last week, and now we’ve got wind. I hope that was the grand finale.Time for all the actors to bow, remove their makeup and go home. 

Stay safe wherever you are. May 2022 treat you well.

How are you faring in the winter weather? Your comments are welcome.   

Author: Sue Fagalde Lick

writer/musician California native, Oregon resident Author of Freelancing for Newspapers, Shoes Full of Sand, Azorean Dreams, Stories Grandma Never Told, Childless by Marriage, and Up Beaver Creek. Most recently, I have published two poetry chapbooks, Gravel Road Ahead and The Widow at the Piano: Confessions of a Distracted Catholic. I have published hundreds of articles, plus essays, fiction and poetry. I'm also pretty good at singing and playing guitar and piano. View all posts by Sue Fagalde Lick