Schoharie, After The Flood: 9/2/2011

I'm still trying to process the events of the past week. By midweek my faith in humanity had hit an all-time low. I felt lost in a sea of apathy, both public and personal. I know I'm different, but I couldn't believe I could be the only one feeling basic human compassion for people who were suffering such devastation. I had been sounding an alarm for what was going on in the Schoharie Valley and elsewhere, and it seemed like all fell on deaf ears. Post after post on Facebook didn't garner as much as a "I feel bad for them," or anything. I felt oddly out of place, like I didn't belong anywhere, like I could drop off the planet and not only would very few people notice, it would take a long time before anyone even bothered to look.

But then I thought of Gandhi; "Be the change you want to see in the world." There were people with bigger problems than mine, and maybe I could really do something to help them. So Thursday night I drove down to Poughkeepsie for Red Cross Disaster Relief training. Seeing all the people there definitely lifted my spirits, but I knew I couldn't do much with the Red Cross until my background check was completed, so I decided to drive out to Schoharie the next day and just see what I could do.

I was not really prepared for what I saw. It's one thing to see it on TV or YouTube, but it's quite another to see it in person. The normally quaint and quiet valley town looked like a bombed out war zone, covered in mud, and it reeked like old, moldy coffee. Dust was everywhere, thick in the air. Heaping piles of collected debris lined the streets. Piles and piles of furniture, television, appliances, clothing, memories, all at the curb in a heap, like the story of a life had been put out with the trash. My heart broke immediately. I could not believe what I was seeing.

I didn't want to drive aimlessly so I pulled over to check the Schoharie Valley Flood Victims page on Facebook for some direction and I got one- Grand Street. I decided to drive to the donation drop center in Middleburgh to get supplies to hand out first. On the way to Middleburgh I drove past several miles of totally destroyed crops, acres and acres of corn either flattened or ruined. It was devastating to see, especially this close to harvest. Imagine getting the bulk of your salary once a year, and after you worked so hard for it all year, all of your hard work was just completely destroyed in less than 24 hours, and your paycheck with it.







When I got into Middleburgh, which looked about the same as Schoharie, I met up with a National Guardsman who greeted me in the Middleburgh Elementary School donation drop site. He could not have been more than 22 years old, and should be a poster boy for his generation. So polite and professional, he helped me load up with some FEMA kits, Salvation Army cleaning kits and food. Loaded up now, I headed back toward Schoharie, determined to find Grand Street. When I got there it was anything but Grand; my jaw just dropped. Because it's a neighborhood off the main road it's a more condensed space and the destruction was so much more apparent. Activity was everywhere. I pulled to the side of the road, got out, and just started asking people what they needed. I know the culture out there- it's like most of upstate NY- they take care of their own and no matter what they desperately need they are uncomfortable with hand-outs and will say they are fine. It took some finesse- especially with the older people- but I unloaded everything.

As I went up the street I met an older guy named Jim; he needed some big strong guys to get a huge freezer out of basement. I said I'd see what I could do. I went a block up to Main Street where everyone seemed already engaged. There was a pack of male teenagers bounding around full of energy, kept on a long leash by a parent. It turns out they were the local high school football team, and doing anything and everything they were asked to do, quite enthusiastically and very seriously. I recruited them for Jim's freezer; they went bounding off down to Grand Street. Last I heard they made short work of Jim's freezer.

I returned to the address I had originally come there to help, where I met volunteer Andrea and her daughter, helping Bill and his daughter Emma cleaning out the house where Emma and her mom live. The whole first floor was just destroyed; there had been 5 feet of water in the first floor; in the middle of the street the water would have been several feet over my head, and the house is 1/2 mile from the creek. As I helped them what was going on around me slowly became apparent to me. Andrea and her daughter were strangers to Bill and Emma, and had ended up there the same way I did (via Facebook). Despite the destruction, Bill, Emma, their neighbors, Jim and his daughters down the street, all of the residents were incredibly friendly and surprisingly upbeat. Bill's neighbors- an elderly couple- refused all help and just sat in the sun on their front lawn relaxing.

There was a non-stop flow of very slow traffic, yet very few were residents. Most were people driving around with various supplies: one truck with bottled water, shovels, cleaning supplies, others with food, sandwiches, etc. Non-stop. You would not have dehydrated on Grand Street if you tried because the roving angels would not let you. Once we managed to get Bill's couch out we took a break out front and the owner of the Apple Barrel restaurant in town pulled into the driveway with his roughly 13 year-old son in a minivan and delivered burgers and lasagne. It turns out he's a friend of Bill's, but he and his son were feeding all of Schoharie- residents, volunteers, workers, everyone. As far as I know they still are. A little while later a woman pulled in with a boy of maybe 7, opened the back of her SUV and poured us iced tea while her son offered homemade chocolate cake. In between them and the roving supply volunteers were various bands of kids in small groups and of all ages pulling wagons and such with coolers, offering bottled water, lemonade, sandwiches, etc. Random people drove by offering help and asking if we knew of anyone who needed help.

I started to realize most of these people were like me; they weren't from Schoharie. They were from everywhere, and just could not sit home and watch what was happening on TV and the Internet. They needed to do something. I know I didn't make much of a dent in what needs to be done that day, but I felt at home doing it, like I was working with long-lost friends. It was an overwhelming and amazing feeling of community. I felt like I belonged somewhere, and I'm not alone, and maybe I'm not so different after all.