Before I started NaNoWriMo, I talked to myself about keeping my expectations in check and realizing that life happens and I would have to roll with the punches. It is good I worked on that because today we had another flood.
All of Amherst had a flash flood . The water was coming in so quickly that our sump pump couldn’t keep up and, once again, my office flooded. I had written about 150 words when this happened but I had to stop, basically in mid sentence.
I could see the water coming up through cracks in the unfinished part of the basement. It was very frightening, so we called the fire department. They came quickly and at first they could not figure out where the water was coming from. They concluded that it was coming up through the basement floor. They tried to pump the water out, using a hose that they snaked through the downstairs bathroom window. To get the hose through the window, one of the firemen put his fist through the screen.
Their pump didn’t work because the waters had started to recede and wasn’t high enough to trigger the float. They advised us to get an external floor pump. Fortunately one of our lovely neighbors had such a pump. Anther neighbor lent us a shorter hose than the one we have and we pumped the water into the toilet.
We then used towels and our water vac to get up the rest of the water. This was particularly discouraging because last weekend we put back all the stuff from one of the rooms downstairs that we had moved out when we had the flood from Tropical Storm Ida.
It was about three hours of solid work and we still will have to put the rooms together again, probably next weekend. The firemen said to throw out one power strip that got wet. That and the screen is really the only damage, which is fine. My papers were all safe.
I was able to come upstairs and write a little more for a total of 319 words today. I feel that was an amazing accomplishment. I am so grateful that we are okay and for the wonderful help from our neighbors. The firemen were very solicitous and understanding and I plan to make a donation in their honor.
As climate change increases, there will only be more of these floods and violent rain storms. The Democrats must pass true climate change legislation for the planet’s sake.