Postscript: Irene

A funny thing happened on the evening the power was restored to my cove neighborhood in West Barrington. One neighbor sat on his porch, strumming guitar. My friends across the street, after checking light switches, computers and TVs to make sure they were functioning, turned everything off, went for a dusk bike ride and then lit their outdoor fire ring, inviting people over to talk. My parents, who generally occupy evening hours at their house on the laptop (Mom) or watching television (Dad), were sitting on the porch in the dark, conversing while looking out at the bay and the planes flying to and from Green Airport. Most of the neighborhood, in fact, was out strolling, cycling or sitting in their porches, chatting amiably.

After going more than four days without power, everyone wanted it back, but once they had it, they were happy to ignore it. The power outage caused by Hurricane Irene seemed to spark something significant and universal in people, even despite the challenges of keeping food and drink cold, cooking, cleaning and doing the wash, or finding our way around the house at night. It felt right to go to sleep to the sound of crickets, wake up to the caterwauling of hungry sea gulls and live the day in concert with the rising heat songs of cicadas. The stars were impossibly bright for a Rhode Island sky too often polluted by excessive human light. You could see Cassiopeia’s W and the Archer’s arrow point and both Dippers dipping in vivid relief, looking like giant-sized versions of glow-in-the-dark stickers plastered on the ceiling above a child’s bed. Neighbors who once barely spoke to one another came out of their houses for no apparent reason and resumed their hurricane-prompted conversations, helping each other clean up, exchanging tools or tips, and sharing new stories about damages and crimes occurring in Rhode Island in the storm’s aftermath. Children grudgingly admitted how much fun it was to play Clue by candlelight and Twister by flashlight. People gathered at the shoreline, marveling at the liquid silver of the bay at twilight, the water lapping in waves of melted moonlight.

It was as if we all knew – whatever we lost when the power went out, we gained something, too. And now that the power was back, we didn’t want to sacrifice our newfound embrace of simple pleasures. Who knows how long it will last? But for the first time since I can’t remember when, the place I call home feels like a neighborhood. Without a doubt, the communities that endured the worst of Irene’s miseries deserve our thoughts and prayers, but in West Barrington, and wherever the storm managed only inconveniences of varying degree, we might want to thank her.

Irene follow-up question: How did you occupy your time while the power was out?

[Note: Half Shell is posting early because of Monday’s Labor Day holiday.]