Our First Hurricane

Well, not my first. I was born here and spent some of my childhood growing up in this area, but it was my husband's first hurricane experience. Thank goodness it was anti-climactic. Katrina came ashore early Monday morning 200 miles to the west of us packing a Category 5 wallop for Mississippi and SE Louisiana. We did little to prepare and we were spared. My father still had Spam from the last hurricane and my grandfather filled up the tub in the second bathroom so he could flush toilets if the power went out. Generators were available if the power was out for any length of time, but they wouldn't run the satellite TV or the air conditioning. Losing either of those would have been a real disaster. My husband and I hunkered down in the RV and we all rode through the storm.

Yesterday morning we drove to town to work on the mobile home. The wind was gusting fiercely and the rain was driving down in horizontal sheets. Not unlike a winter storm on the Oregon Coast, only here it was 87 degrees, not 57. Ed painted and I scrubbed down the wallpaper in the kitchen. The trailer is a 1993 Skyline and is in pretty good shape, though it's obvious that whoever lived there before had small children and cooked a lot of fried food. Today I tackled the electric range with something called Mean Green Cleaner & Degreaser and a scrubby sponge; I scrubbed at the baked on dreck around one of the burners for close to an hour. It was a dirty, nasty job, but someone had to do it. We do feel good about putting time into fixing up the trailer, knowing that it will be our new home. Or at least our next home once we vacate the RV.

We picked out a soft beige color for the living room, hallway and utility room. On the walls, it looks, well, pink. Ed thinks that it will be better once we get the brown carpet in; now it's reflecting the red/maroon stuff we'll pull up and replace. The color does look better, too, now that he's painted the white trim at the top. The cabinets in the kitchen are the cheapest variety available -- particle board with paper printed to look like some strange, pale wood. The paper is coming up and some of the cupboard doors are so warped they won't close. The idea is to take as much of the paper off as possible, spackle and prime, then paint the whole kitchen a teal seafoam green that will go with the existing wallpaper. Pink and green. Truly a Florida color scheme.

Good news today. We may be able to get the trailer moved to our property on the other side of the lake Thursday or Friday. Then, we'll have to get a permit, have an inspection, get power hooked up, and get a well in. Seems like the list of things to do never ends, but we are taking it a day at a time and finding much to enjoy in the adventure of starting a life in a new place. I've mostly decided to suspend my job search until we are into the trailer. I'd like the feel of being "settled" before I take on the stress of looking for work. Besides, all my good clothes are in that pile of stuff in the "barn." Ed decided not to go into the bread biz with my father. He is working for Sand Creek for the time being. We have an appointment to meet with the architect September 13.

Friday, for Date Night, we went to Ft Walton for a steak dinner. Afterwards, I suggested we play mini golf, so we went to the original Goofy Golf on Eglin Parkway. I used to go there when I was a kid! And it hasn't changed -- still the same painted plaster and mason block attractions, The Cyclops, the Bowling Pins, Humpty Dumpty, still the same bright green Astroturf and neon colored balls. There are two 18-hole courses and we played Course No. 2. There were families with small children, young adults with no kids, old people (even one with a walker) all sweating slightly and swinging metal putters (little ones for the kids) under the buggy fluorescent lights. If you drive the ball into the snake's mouth on the last hole for both courses, you get a free game. Maybe that would be a bigger deal if it didn't cost $2 a game to play. Goofy Golf opened in this location in 1956 and, judging by last Friday night, it's still a popular place to spend an hour. My husband beat me, but we'll play again -- Course No. 1 next time. We finished the evening by going to Sonic for a root beer float.

Sunday we went to First Presbyterian in Crestview. Like our former church, it was a big building with a not-so-big congregation. They have a woman interim pastor and it's hard to know how the members feel about that; there was no worship assistant reading prayers or giving announcements. The pastor had the most wonderful voice and the message, from Matthew 16, was good and dealt with the "prerequisites" for faith. There was a small choir and one of the members approached me after service about coming to visit again, maybe singing with the choir. The congregation was mostly older and I sensed the same struggle there we'd seen at home (and which probably plagues most of the mainstream denominations): how do you carry on Tradition and still remain relevant to people today, people who often have no church background? One point of connection and contention is music. We sang "Here I Am" for the closing hymn and I mentioned to my husband that it's probably the most current music in their church, written in the 1980s. The opening hymn was written in 1404. I miss the mix of Traditional and contemporary music we enjoyed at Community Pres; striking the balance was never easy, but now I realize what a worthwhile effort it was. It's difficult to relate to music written hundreds of years ago with words we no longer use or even recognize. Anyway, the folks were friendly at First Pres. The pastor welcomed us warmly during the greeting time and an 81-year-old "widder woman" (her own self-description) clasped my hand in the parking lot and held it for a chat. My husband said he felt more comfortable in this church than in the previous ones we'd visited. "Comfort" is not our number one criteria; we're looking for a place to become a part of a faith family, still it's good to feel that you know your way around when it comes to ways people worship. We haven't decided if we'll return next Sunday.

My husband is fishing tonight, the way he enjoys relaxing after a hard day's work. He catches brim and puts them in a little box off the dock. Tomorrow he and my father are going to make a catfish delivery to a man who wants a hundred whiskered fish for his pond. The sun is going down earlier now. Tonight, the sky is fair and faint apricot-colored and a breeze ruffles the lake. I haven't been walking the last few days (we leave to work on the trailer at 6 a.m.) but Brody and I will hit the trail again in the morning, a good way to greet the day.