I just got home from an intense 48 hours of going to the beach, watering all my potted plants (gophers), and collecting more teacups for my dining-room side hustle selling dishes.
It looked like sunshine, but only the first half day. After that, clouds and more clouds, but good for working in the yard weather. Since I’m old, I have to pace myself and not hurt any body parts. My neck usually tells me when to quit.
I filled up one green can this time, instead of the three cans last time. My shared-driveway neighbor brings my cans up the long driveway after they get picked up. Last time the lid was broken, so I called the waste management company and ordered a new can. When I got there this time, two days ago, my neighbor had commandeered the new can and had given me her old one. I went to switch them and saw she had already put her food waste in the new can. Then I thought, who cares? It’s a garbage can. I let it go.
One good thing about getting old is letting lots of stuff go, both physical items and abstract stuff in your head. A good thing about the beach is that after weeding and watering the plants, it was time to stretch my legs and go thrifting. I never even turned on the laptop. When I got home, it was so nice out that I decided to eat my lunch in the backyard, still no internet getting in the way of my to-do list.
Then I ran out for a couple more thrift stores that are only open on Saturdays and not Sundays and scored a 75% off sale. The shop had lots of antique tea cups and a leather-bound book of all the Beatles songs. I got out of there for a song with two big boxes of dishes.
Back home, I sat down, consumed some ice cream and turned on the news. It was the day after the 4th of July, and the Guadalupe River had flooded in central Texas. Dozens of campers from multiple sleep-away camps were missing. The river had risen 26 feet in 45 minutes before dawn (3:11) on Friday morning. Needless to say, my pleasant day took a turn as I went down the Facebook rabbit hole to find out more about what had happened.
People being plucked from trees. Some young girls actually surviving, three guy counselors at a neighboring camp putting the boys up into the rafters when the water rose higher than the top bunks of the bunk beds. The three counselors treaded water for as long as they needed. Stories of survival.
The next day, after more weeding and watering (this time the large front yard), car washing and thrifting after getting the Sunday paper, I went inside to eat because it was cold and windy. I fired up the internet. Not so many stories of survival, just photos of young girls and their college-aged counselors found dead. Throw on top of that the fireworks warehouse explosion in Northern California where three brothers and four others died (they found the bodies), and it was a dire news day.
The first emergency alarm in Texas sounded around 5:00 a.m. but by then, it was too late for the camp counselors to be alerted. Did they have cell service? Internet? Did they realize the thunderstorm was creating a danger? Did they have anywhere else to go?
One of the older campers on Senior Hill (at Camp Mystic) survived and had her nametag pinned on, just in case, so first responders would know who she was. At 16, she was thinking ahead. As other girls joined her cabin and shared beds because their cabins had flooded, did they realize what had happened to the lower cabins? Would any child know what to do?
Then the political stuff, whose fault it was, of course. Sadly, the Guadalupe River had flooded its banks many times over the years, but it had been 38 years since the last big flood, and the owner of Camp Mystic for Girls had never seen it happen. He tried to save the girls in the lowest cabin, closest to the river, and also got swept away.
Some girls and one counselor are still missing. The boys at Camp La Junta survived.
There is an advantage to being in nature, doing physical work, and not knowing the tragedies going on. Plus, it’s easier to sleep with a head full of bad stuff when your body is physically exhausted.
FIRST DATE, WORST DATE EVER! 