Waiting quietly

The odd juxtaposition of the present moment's seeming normalcy and what we know is coming

In 2008, the city where I lived experienced its worst flood in 95 years.

It hit under surreal conditions. The area had seen relentless torrential rains for days, but the sky had been clear for about a day when the water started rising in a truly threatening way.

It was a delightful June Saturday evening. I was playing in a musical duo on the patio of a local hotel. My colleague had come in from the county to the west, the landscape of which is characterized by hills and hollers. I’d heard that some areas out his way were getting hard to traverse, but he said his ride over on the main highway was uneventful.

I did notice that water had risen to the entrance of the park across the street from the hotel, but that park had been designed to accommodate flooding, and I’d seen it that high a few times.

But as we were setting up, the lobby filled with people coming in off the interstate regaling each other with stories of encroaching water.

We played one tune, discussed how the lobby crowd was still growing, and agreed that the prudent course of action was to pack up and head to my place.

It was a normal drive over to my house, although power was out in several homes in my neighborhood. Our lights stayed on for several hours, which allowed us to charge devices and watch television news coverage. Then the house went dark and silent. We stayed abreast of developments by tuning into local radio on a boom box. Close to midnight, my musician friend, my wife and I concluded that our neighborhood was elevated enough that we were going to escape nature’s wrath.

We decided to venture out. Six blocks to our north, water had crossed a main north-south thoroughfare and come a block east. People were sitting on their porches, watching the water lazily lap at their lawns. It was eerily quiet and the stars were bright. The residents along Franklin Street, however, knew the water was still rising. There was nothing to do but watch it.

The aftermath took days to assess, mainly due to travel difficulty. It didn’t take long, though, for the scope of devastation to become apparent. (My friend found a circuitous route out of town and back to the hills.)

There’s a touch of that feeling at the present moment. Several cases of coronavirus have been documented in the county north of here, and the community college at which I’m adjunct faculty is suspending classroom instruction until April 6 (after this evening’s classes, which I find a bit odd).

Life in our city, except for such precautions, continues apace. My gym was full this morning. I’ve reported on several government meetings so far this week.

Still, such national and world-stage developments as the head of the World Health Organization declaring a global pandemic, German chancellor Angela Merkel predicting that 70 percent of her nation’s population could become infected, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average taking a dive so deep it negated yesterday’s rally make it clear that not taking this seriously is not an option.

I’m encouraged by Dr. Anthony Fauci’s straight talk about the magnitude of this crisis. He comes across so authoritatively that President Trump’s attempts to reassure the nation via a flurry of tweets today seem superfluous. Which is fine. The firewall against complete chaos in the age of the Very Stable Genius has always been the presence of a critical number of grownups.

The uncertainty is the hardest aspect. Like those residents sitting on their porches 12 years ago on what, except for the steady press of water, seemed like a splendid late-spring night, the question of what the magnitude is going to be looms over every conversation about this.

This is why, despite the venomous reaction from the elements in our culture that have been instrumental in turning our nation away from its historic reverence for its Creator, it was exactly the right move for Vice President Mike Pence and the coronavirus task force to commence its first meeting with a prayer.

We know how this - and by this, I mean the basic human predicament and the overall jagged nature of this universe - ultimately turns out. It all rolls up like a big carpet and the wheat and the chaff each go to their designated destinations. In the meantime, though, it behooves us to enlist the protection and guidance of the one who gave this nation a special birthright and just might continue to bestow it if we’ll turn around and face him in humility and let him be the captain of the team.