First off, yes, this is personal account. I don’t intend to offend anyone by this story, it’s just the way I felt about it. If you feel that you absolutely must flame me for it, go ahead. It won’t affect me because everyone takes everything differently, and the way I reacted to this has no bearing whatsoever on your life or the way you may be coping with it. And I think it's pretty obvious what I'm referring to.

Hurricane

The first time I saw a hurricane, I was seven years old.

It wasn’t much of a hurricane by most standards – clocking in at a mid-sized Category 2 at best – but I thought it would be such an interesting thing, something to talk about – Oh, yes, I was in that hurricane. Dreadful winds, you know – but it just turned out to be a nuisance. The only thing I remember about it was sitting in the local hospital (the only shelter we could get into, and besides, my mother worked there) in line to get food, watching the rain lash against the windows and I remember thinking, but what does it sound like? The windows and walls were so thick; I couldn’t hear a thing. I wasn’t even slightly scared.

The second time I saw a hurricane, I was fourteen years old, and for a while there, I was the only one who cared. Everyone was saying that they were overreacting to this system, that it wouldn’t be half as bad as they were saying it was, but I was freaking out over it, absolutely sure that we were all gonna die.

I remember catching myself panicking once, though, and thinking about why I cared. Every time a hurricane would narrowly miss us and everyone breathed this huge sigh of relief, I was always so disappointed because I wanted something to happen, something Earth-shattering, something that would make my life feel like a story, and I realized that maybe this was it. But then the storm hit and I was still so disappointed, even though the northeastern quadrant ran into my city at either low cat 3 or high cat 2. No one could come to a decision on it. I didn’t think it really mattered that much. There isn’t much difference between 1 mile an hour and 2.

But it came in during the day, and I remember sitting in the living room, listening to the wind and the rain, and I remember thinking, this isn’t so bad. There wasn’t any lightning or thunder, and the sky wasn’t even particularly dark, it was just a lot of rain and a lot of wind. And then the power went out and I got this sudden adrenaline rush, like this is it! but nothing particularly dangerous happened to me. I was listening to the radio reports talking about how bad it was in New Orleans and how bad it was on the coast, and I guess I could see how, but for some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to care.

It wasn’t that I didn’t feel bad for the people, but in a way, I think I knew how this would turn out – everyone blaming everyone else for something that’s no one’s fault but the Atlantic’s – and I didn’t want to give a damn when everyone else would be sobbing and pleading for help. I was always such a firm believer in sticking it out and dealing with the crap life throws you because crying about it never did anyone any good, but I couldn’t say that because then I’d be called cold, so I just pretended to care.

And then the storm passed and we were just sitting there, no power, nothing to do but saw on a few trees and cook all the food in our freezer, and I felt so detached from everything. It was strange that I should feel left out when I was the one living in it, but everyone else was getting on CBS News and discussing who should take the fall for some stupid mistakes and I remember wanting to go up there and scream at them – If you’re so goddamn worried about us, why don’t youcome down here and help? But I was just a kid in Mississippi, and not even one who had lost her house, so therefore, I was invisible.

And I remember thinking that all this danger and all this panic was all worthless because the storm itself really wasn’t that bad, it was the aftermath when everyone fought each other and brothers shot sisters for a gallon of gas and people charged 10 dollars for a bag of ice that everyone remembers, not the fact that there wasn’t even any lightning or the fact that some of these people just want to forget about the stupid hurricane and don’t care about getting what they deserve from the government because some of these people understand that its nobody’s fault but your own if you weren’t prepared. But then again, I was just a kid from Mississippi, and not even one who was seriously affected, so therefore, I was invisible.

The political storm was worse than the real storm and the anticipation was worse than the actual catalyst, so the only thing I remember about the storm is how disappointed I was by it all. And now, it’s become a marketing technique, and all I can think about is, weren’t you so worried about offending these people a year ago? What happened to “people died in this storm”? What happened to “people’s lives were destroyed”? When did a hurricane turn from something to be feared to something to be exploited?

But, really, I’m just a kid from Mississippi, whom everyone says doesn’t know what she’s talking about, so therefore, I’m invisible.