Editor’s Note: The Cleveland Indians- are we supposed to say that these days?- have done something quite remarkable, and I enjoy seeing it. 22-straight victories, and they seem prepared to accomplish something Joe DiMaggio-esque in the next few as we roll into the divisional play-offs. We will see how they do. But Marlow has an account about the high inside fastball that Irma threw at his beloved Florida Keys this morning, and that is something to reach for the rosin bag for, and tap the clay from the cleats with your bat. Recovery is a bitch, even if you are not on the news any more.

I am not giving to the Red Cross this time. I am giving to Team Rubicon for Florida and the USVI.

I am not even going to start with the North Koreans and their rockets, or the idiots who thnk blowing up London Tubes is an act of free speech.

– Vic

Storm Interview

He was one of a midnight crew who never missed a fun night out on the town. Friday night happy hours after work were endless one-more-for-the-road times. No one ever got hurt at a hurricane party he was fond of saying. Last Saturday in the early morning darkness, he once again chose to stay.

He had enjoyed over thirty straight years of no-hitters in the storm game on that little island chain. No one ever chided him and the other stayers about their streaks or hanging out at near empty taverns with the other grizzled salts of the Keys, while hurricanes raged on outside. Even when declared, no curfew ever kept him at home. He never got hurt, but last Sunday was like Casey at the Bat in the bottom of the ninth of the seventh game of the World Series.

Somehow he sensed that this one would be an all night-long bus ride in a no-sleep world. He left Duval Street and hunkered down in his small place up the Keys. He chose to swing again for the fences and like Casey, he struck out.

No one couldn’t reach him for days. Some looked at his place on the NOAA imagery and saw the debris field that spewed forth from his home. Searches of social networks and bulletin boards found no mentions.

Then he appeared. He didn’t counterfeit fear or humility for the interviewer. He didn’t turn it on for the camera. He was himself – a thoughtful, slow-talking man. That’s the way he rolls. To those who knew him, he was struggling to keep to the usual routines of his now former life. There were no stems of wine to be knocked down, no laughs to be grabbed and he hit the sheets well before the curfew. He knew he wouldn’t get restful sleep but he had to try.

When asked by the PODcasting microphone guy, he said it finally occurred to him after they closed the Keys bridges that his no-hitter streak might be about to end. He couldn’t remember exactly when this thought took shape. But his description of the storm was riveting. He knew when he had to leave his soon to be surge-battered house for higher, safer ground in a neighbor’s empty, storm-spec, stilt house.

He talked about taking each hour, one at a time. There was no one around to consult for advice. Everything was now instinctual and survival training based on his long ago attendance at one such US military school.

In his neighbor’s house, he tried to start some new routines, certain things exactlty the same every hour. Yeah, some might say this was silly superstition, but sameness would lead to calmness and clear headedness.

Some say the last true superstorm to hit the Keys was on Labor Day 1935. He figured this one would miss him, since the destructive zone looked to be about 30 miles across and headed straight for Key West. But Irma threw him a slider-curveball or slurve. She veered right over him and his home plate.

At times I could sense how reflective he was. In several brief shots, he picked up his stuff and put the keepers in a small pile, while pitching the unsalvageable like a kid skipping stones across a river, so easy was his motion. Occasionally, he examined something as if it were made of crystal and could reveal the secrets of what was to come.

I saw him age as the video went on. I could feel the sadness of a suddenly old man who had desperately held onto his youth. He had squeezed everything he could out of life with his powerful hands, muscular arms, iron will and easy laugh.

There was none of the customary talk when the reporter asked him about the ravages of the law of averages regarding his decision to stay. He never second guessed others and he wasn’t about to do that to himself.

Irma threw him a high hard one inside. He bent backwards as its 130+ MPH winds smashed his house. He heard it explode he said. That is when he said to the reporter, ” STEEERIKE THREE!” The reporter was stunned into silence by this exclamation.

“I made the decision and I’m fine with it. Wouldn’t change a thing.” His words were gracious, unregretful, and unboastful. He wouldn’t bend to the reporter’s attempt to get him to say he had learned some lesson or such.

“This shows what can happen when you take risks.” That was as close as he came to suggesting that God is too tolerant with the margin of error he grants us mortals.

Hurricane Irma as she struck the Lower Keys

I wondered if the reporter had asked him if he was satisfied with his decision and then edited it out from his piece. I suspected he would have said “How am I to be satisfied? You just got to adjust yourself.” It was all about the moment with a dollop of ill chance. In the end, people must forget what led them to where they are and adjust themselves to the outcome.

What I saw was a ghastly scene of devastation that would take most of those affected many, many months, if not years, to clean, repair and recover both physically and emotionally. Amidst the harshest reality, his losses were total, but his character was not just intact but strengthened.

Copyright © 2017 From My Isle Seat
www.vicsocotra.com