Wilma

As it turns out, this one was "for real."

Sunday, after doing laundry and picking up a copy of Batman Begins, we grilled churrasco and huddled together on Apt. 1's couch watching Christian Bale depict the best Batman ever. I went to bed late, hardly thinking about the category 3 storm that was on its way.

I awoke Monday morning to the sound of screaming wind at my large, southerly window. Cervantes was huddled by my shoulder, and a grey-blue half light filled the entire house. Mesmerized by the swirling trees and gusting winds outside, I sat curled in my comforter and stared into the storm. Eventually, my housemates began to stir as well, and we all ended up on my bed by 8:30, when the strongest winds passed over Miami. I later learned that those same winds were 120 mph, with gusts up to 160. One of those gusts knocked over a huge tree in our back yard, flipped my Vespa, and tore out the fence along the pool area.

Our power was already out when I woke up, so there was little to do but wait for the storm to pass. I took a short nap, and then went around to see how our apartment had fared. There was water coming in from various joints and crevices, so together M. and I attacked the kitchen. We scoured the house, I cleaned my room, dusted, put away my clean laundry, and in general attempted to minimize the chaos in the house. Sadly surveying the contents of our fridge, we made a list of things that would have to go and ate the melting sorbet in the freezer.

By noon, patches of blue sky peeked out as the last cloud bands whipped through the city. I picked up my scooter, cleaned off most of the grit and sap from broken branches, and took a tour of Biscayne. Nothing had power, and as far as I could see, there wasn't a single traffic light. Not only were they not turned on, but most of them had been ripped right off of their wires. One woman, having tied two broken lights to the top of her car and stashed another in her trunk, was being arrested by the police. I'm not sure what kind of an offense that was: looting? vandalism? stealing state property? It's unclear.

What was patently obvious was that Miami got rocked. Apart from that, we were completely out of the loop. No grocery stores, no cell phone service, no power, and no news. It's very odd to feel yourself completely cut off from the rest of the world, while at the same time being the focus of some of the world's news.

Due to evil daylight savings time, we had to hustle up to cook dinner before the sun set. Thank god for gas stoves and barbeques. After a dinner of fresh tortilla, we reconvened with the folks from upstairs out in the cluttered back yeard to enjoy a crisp sunset. For the first time this year, a cool refreshing breeze blew through Miami, and for the first time in decades, Miami residents could watch the stars pop out of the sky in true unpolluted darkness. A sparkling sky above, wrapped in my favorite HC sweatshirt, finally blessed with a (weak) cell phone signal, life seemed pretty okay. We ended up spending most of the time drinking hot chocolate spiked with various liquors and drinking the last of the cold beer in the fridge. Hell yeah for hurricanes.

Unfortunately, this idyllic trend did not continue. Tuesday was more of the same fun, but less food...even the grocery stores were shut down. Luckily we stocked up before the storm. A crab feast from Chef Creole was the dinner event, eaten by candlelight in the kitchen. Someone should not have let several batty educators come within arm's reach of candles and meltable objects. Stuffed with creole ribs, yellow rice, and stone crab, I proceeded to melt several plastic utensils together in order to form some sort of non-representational sculpture. Fortuitously, said amalgam of twisted and charred polymers produced rather amusing shadows on the wall. Even "adults" can find pleasure in shadow puppets, it seems. That entertained us for much longer than it should have, and I even suggested marketing similar sculptures to a mass market. My roommates, those negative ninnies, declared that *with* electricity the spoon-puppets would be markedly less valuable. This remains to be seen.

Wednesday the news came in that I was to flee the storm-wracked South Florida coast, but my flight never left Ft. Lauderdale due to the damn fire marshall. Apparently, there weren't enough "safety features" with electricity for the airport to operate.
We sought refuge on Lincoln Road, hoping to find a movie and some food, as well as a place to charge our dying cell phones, but alas, the theaters were still closed, and lines for gas stretched for blocks around the gas stations. We managed to kill a couple of hours walking around and shopping, then were treated to dinner by the upstairs neighbors. One of their girlfriends is a hotel cook, who inherited a 20 lb. turkey when the hotel decided to cut its losses and close up for the remainder of the power outage.

Luckily I did manage to escape on Thursday, and spent the next 6 days in a real house with electricity. Cold, yes, but at least there was power. Shopping, Harry Potter, and lots of home-cooked meals were rather delightful. School was postoponed several times, until we finally got the go for the following Thursday, November 3rd.

I headed back to sunny South Florida on Wednesday to find things pretty much in the same state as I left them. Traffic was still a mess, and now instead of a cool fall breeze, the weather had turned up the heat. Electricity had not been restored to over 40 percent of paying customers in Miami-Dade County, so god only knows how many individual citizens were powerless (metaphorically and literally).

Reluctantly, we laid our heads down on Wednesday night, knowing full well that there was work the next day. Cell phones charged, acting as surrogate alarm clocks, the four of us arose in pich darkness until the smell of phosphorus and candle wax jerked us awake. Note to self: don't try to pick out professional dress outfits by candlelight at 5:40 am. It doesn't end well. So not only could we not eat breakfast (no milk, no dairy, due to lack of refrigeration), not see what we're doing in our own house before work, nor have any contact with the outside world electronically, it's also the end of daylight savings. I drove home from soccer practice just as the sun set over the western horizon in my rear view mirror, and fumbled with my keys in a house that was just as dark as I'd left it 12 hours earlier that morning.

Thursday, day 1 back at work, is over. I decided to tempt fate as my roommates had, and venture a run in the nearby middle-class neighborhood across Biscayne. Huge mounds of debris, a lack of streetlights, and perilously close shaves with oncoming cars, not to mention wary homeowners shouting "acuestese ya!" all contributed to cutting my exercise short. Slightly disheartened, I jogged home to pack up for our outing to Brickell. M's boyfriend M had power back, so the plan was to pick up some tasty takeout and watch the O.C. en masse while charging various portable electronic devices and/or showering with hot water (oh, the novelty). This was now becoming a habit, so we all assumed that the trip would go according to schedule. Cervantes, now officially batty due to his extended time alone in the house, got packed up with his litterbox to accompany the dPlace crew.

Oh, oh, how little I knew then.

Sweaty, hungry, and tired we show up with backpacks full of clean clothes and towels, three Baja Fresh carryout bags, a litterbox, three computers, four cellphones, and one angry, angry cat. Up the elevator, down the hall, turn the corner, and turn the knob...Wait. Why didn't the knob turn?

Unfortunately, M's roommate (against M's warning) had locked the door and we were keyless. Stupefied, we stand in the hall for a moment, the clock ticking down minutes 'till 8:00 pm, when our show starts. Lo and behold, who should show up but one of M's friends from the building across the hall! Saved! Glory Day! Plan B goes into effect: haul all our shit over to unknown-friend-of-M's apartment and chill out until someone shows up with a key. Sure, fine. We plop down on the couches, begin our dinner while Cervantes cowers in the bathtub, refusing to move. Things are improving: there's television, we've now been fed, and there's hope for the future.

Circa 8:30 the fire alarm starts. Please, please let it be a test. Please, please somebody have burnt popcorn and it just goes away. 8:40, and the screaming alarm has not abated. In a bit of a panic, I grab the most important thing I can think of and rush out of the building with Mary, VA and Carlos. Thus, at 8:45 pm, there I was sitting in the middle of a parking lot littered with glass shards from blown out windows cradling a hyperventilating cat, still in my running clothes.

FYI: low point of the month.

For another 30 minutes, we watched as fire trucks arrived, inspected the building, and determined that the elevator malfunction which triggered the alarm was indeed harmless. This entire time, poor little Cervantes is wheezing harder and harder into the crook of my arm as his little synapses explode with sensory overload. Flashing lights, screeching cars, street cleaning, fire sirens, the whole 9 yards plus an extra two feet. Around 9:20 one of M's roommates finally arrives, we do a quick feline handoff to get the poor guy inside a building, and we try to get back into building 2. Plan C goes into effect: retrieve belongings from building 2, rejoin cat and host in building 1, shower, then sleep back home in the dark.

But wait...there's more! As we're coordinating Plan C, the doors to building 2 swing shut as the firemen leave. Now, it is nearly 10:00 pm, and we're stuck in the lobby of building 2 trying to get someone to let us into the locked 4th floor of the building. After Mary totally sketched out one resident, we conceded defeat to the gods of catastrophe and collapsed in the leather chairs next to the fake ficus.

Plan D comes through in the end; we held out until the guy who actually lived in building 2 came home, snatched our things as quickly as possible, showered in a rush in M's apartment (located at the top of building 1), dragged the cat out from under the bed, and drove back to our own humble abode.

At 11:30 pm I crawled into my own bed, knowing full well that I'd have to stumble out of it again in a few hours' time to light the candles and get up for work.

Let it suffice to say that on Sunday evening, after 13 full days without power, we were all glad to be ABLE to turn off the lights and go to bed.

Nocturnal Activities

I was awake at 6:15 this morning. Normally, Ms. Williamson in a state of conscious thought would be no novelty. In fact, on a weekday, if I weren't up by 6:15 there would be serious cause for worry. Fortunately, last night wasn't a weeknight, or I'd have been fucked. I climbed into my soft, happy bed circa 6:10 after a quite wonderful night out on the town.

Yesterday began pretty abysmally, with a standardized test. In order to be a "highly qualified" teacher, I had to take a General Knowledge exam from the state of Florida. Technically, this was supposed to have been completed at the end of my first year of teaching. Whatever, man, they can't *afford* to fire me. Nevertheless (note competent use of transitional phrase here, a la FCAT) I decided to comply with the district's regulations about qualifying me to be a public school teacher. Waking up at 7:00 on a Saturady wasn't exactly my first choice of activities, but what I didn't know then was that school would be cancelled for two more days, making the sacrifice of my Saturday less than a hardship.

After a wretched three hours of mindless testing (AKA the pseudo-FCAT-for-teachers), I was starving, freezing, and very tired. I gobbled down some Publix sushi, attempted and failed to read my book. My intellectual needs then conceded defeat to my corporeal desires, and I proceeded to sleep for a good four hours. There was a rancid air surrounding my mood all of yesterday: I was pissed that it was Dave's birthday and I didn't get to spend it with him; I had to take some stupid test; there was a huge-ass storm on the way being fickle and unpredictable, and absolutely nothing I could do about any of these things.

When VA came and woke me up at 6:00, I frankly remarked "I'm in a foul mood; fair warning." Things slightly improved as she convinced me to trek north to DSW. As the sun sank down, my spirits rose with the help of an iced coffee and some teal velvet pumps. Then, deciding to participate in the DDH birthday spirit, I bought him a present. The funk finally left when we got around to eating at 9:30. C. joined us, and we stretched our "light snack" into a 2 hour dinner.

For some reason, I also let myself be convinced to make an appearance at Tobacco Road for Heimy's dad's birthday. Slightly surreal to be at a bar with TFA-ers and someone's parents, but fun enough. Some light Spanish rock, and several strange late 90's covers to pass the time, and then the party migrated outside. Caught up in the moment, I hopped in one of three cars heading east to Purdy Lounge, and ended up there for the remainder of the evening. There's nothing like a good DJ who knows his crowd: a little old school and a little new school hip hop to keep the twentysomethings out on the dance floor. It felt strangely familiar to be out in a club with a group of friends; I clearly wasn't there to pick up guys or be hit on by strange sketchy anonymous men. There were non-sketchy teacher boys to protect me from unwanted advances, and girlfriends' budding flirtations to entertain my need for vicarious romance.

No longer even remotely tipsy from the two beers I had way back at T. Road, I felt a strange euphoria when we arrived back at dPlace circa 5:30 am. There were hints of freshman year "I have all the fun I need to sober," but also vestiges of "I'm lonely and needing male attention so I'll just be a little flirty" from, well, every other year =). The bizarre high that comes from being in a club having fun was messing with my head, along with my irregular sleep patterns from the days before, so I couldn't sleep.

Instead, I attempted to pinpoint just where this vague feeling of familiarity was coming from. One not-so-subtle source came to me by way of my garments. Randomly (or perhaps subconsciously) I had chosen the same white Zara shirt featured in the "Picture With the Biggest Smile Ever" from a long, long, May night in Madrid. A little gazing at said picture was enough to both bring another, smaller smile to my face and remind my self to turn the page and put the album away. It's best not to romanticize events that waft in from the past; I need to remind myself that I spent the end of *that* night sobbing into my journal, alone in a one-bed hostel. For other less obvious reasons, my night out also reminded me of Venice, so I took a little trek down a few memory canals, alternately wistful and chagrined.

Thoroughly temporally disoriented, and as Ani says "lost in the folds of my memory," I happened to glance at the clock to see 5:58 glowing placidly back at me. Since my hair still reeked of smoke and other bar smells, I hopped in the shower to rid myself of the residue of the evening. If only I could have done the same with the inside of my head. Confused but happy, I at last fell into bed around the time I would normally awake for work.

I'm still not quite on a normal sleeping pattern due to a leisurely wakeup time today, but I've got a few more days to get back on track. Speaking of tracking, I should get up early to see what Wilma's going to do to South Florida. It's a little bit exciting, but I'm worried that this one's for real.

Teacher Planning

Thanks to the end of the first quarter and the Jews, there are a lot of teacher planning days in October. We even had one last random one thrown in last Thursday, for Yom Kippur. I still don't know if it's pronounced "yaahm kipper" or "yoohm keep-uhr." Rachael may kill me, but right now I don't care. I also haven't seen her in six months, so that's less of an issue.

I received a much-needed blast from the past on our second to last teacher planning day. Immediately after turning in 14 pages of bubble sheets, I hustled down to the MIA to pick up one Amanda Eve. We swung by Central to check up on the girls' soccer car wash, which was mildly successful. It was interesting walking around my new high school with one of my closest friends *from* high school, not to mention a bit surreal.

We proceeded directly home by way of Pollo Tropical, the paragon of Miami fast food, and then fell immediately asleep on a rainy Friday afternoon. The weekend consisted mainly of sleeping, eating, shopping, and movies, with a bit of a late-late-late night on South Beach with 'Los and other TFA-ers thrown in there somewhere. Then, in a blaze of Columbus Day glory, the sun came out of its rainy garb for an entire day. All of Sunday was divine: brunch at the now traditional Icebox Cafe, a stroll through the Lincoln Road antique sales resulting in hot-hot-spicy-hot new barstools (in grape, goldenrod, magenta, and pumpkin), a lovely dip in the atlantic ocean, and a stellar finish with Mary back in town: grilled snapper, french green beans and white russians for dessert.

Although it was sad taking Mandi back to the runways, I really felt like we had meaningful time to spend together, something that even Dave and I have been short on recently. Being around old friends feels like home, and it makes this temporary home feel more comfortable. Sharing your present life with people from your past reconnects with them, but also reaffirms the contrasts in your respective existences. It was, on the whole, a lovely visit. And I have new barstools. Did I mention that?

The next week was a bit of a washout: Tuesday and Wednesday class, planning day on Thursday which turned into a "bitch-at-the-Zone-liason" session for three hours. If I remember correctly, I was also mildly hungover from a long Wednesday of soccer followed by Alias and Pinot Noir. I have addicted my housemates (with great ease, I might add) to my favorite vice: the fictional world of Sydney Bristow. We've burned our way throught the first three seasons (they watched ALL of season one in one weekend when I wasn't there), and are about to get a much anticipated season four as soon as it's released on DVD in two weeks. I'm not sure what it is about the show that draws people in so intensely; perhaps it's at once the antithesis and explanation to my current living situation. How is this possible, you ask?

Well, in the first place, I am not a secret agent for the CIA. No seriously, I'm not. I mean, even if I am (which I'm not), that guy in the program told me not to *mention* that. Secondarily, I am not dating Michael Vartan; while that might be fun, I'm pretty pleased with the long-distance relationship that I've got going on, and have no wish to extend that distance to L.A. Lastly, my family, however weird, is nowhere nearly as f-ed up as Sydneys.

The tenuous but mildly interesting parallels which I can draw between Ms. Bristow's life and Ms. Williamson's are as follows: 1. in my daily life, I wear a lot more suits and oxford dress shirts than I have ever worn in my life (since I left McDonogh), and my other fashion choices are about as dissimilar to work clothing as Syd's disguises are from her office apparel. 2. Teaching involves about ten times more duplicity than I would have imagined. I have had intense training in compartmentalizing emotions, putting on facades, and acting meaner, angrier, and let's face it, less angry than I really am. There are very few students who actually know my personality at all. I guess that's one of the drawbacks of being a teacher in this environment; there are few times when you really get to be "yourself."

It used to be that soccer was the place where I could relax, unwind, and let my guard down. Last week, it was rough. The prima donnas who never come to practice decided to show up and give me attitude, an abnormally high percentage of flaky kids refused to follow directions, and our usually competent core of returning players either didn't show up or didn't speak up to get the other girls to retrieve their heads from their asses. By Friday afternoon, I was ready to quit. I even told Gemma I was going to.

Then, after a wonderful weekend which included one indie rock concert, 6 episodes of Alias, two slices of bacon, one movie, and one trip to Aventura, I returned to practice today rejuvenated. Took the kids on a run, impressed them with my now-competent Coerver skills, and slammed a couple of half-volleys into the net. It's pretty ironic that a lot of my technical skills, which were so lacking in college when I was so uptight and nervous about playing, have actually improved in the past two years. It's kind of refreshing. I guess I'm not all washed up after all.

Well, it's getting later than I had anticipated, and chatting with Mr. Henry this evening pushed my bedtime back even further. I suppose profound comments regarding backyard musical productions and bright barstools will have to wait for a later time.

BTW, I also figured out where I've blown all my "free" time lately, instead of wasting it here on the blog: Netflix. Sweet, sweet Netflix. Oh well; there could be much worse addictions.