Disastering

my room in the Tan-y-deri house at Taliesin, Wisconsin. i'm in the process of adapting it to be my own (including the kleenex around the edge of the windowsill to keep out the mosquitos)

Out of all the things, the most interesting one i've come across (besides the state of Nebraska) is a pamphlet found in the Taliesin kitchen: "Project Recovery: Suggestions for coping with the emotional aftermath of a disaster".

The paragraph on the cover states:

Disasters often strike with little or no warning. In an instant, your home and community can be damaged or destroyed and forever changed. Even if your home or business does not suffer directly, you can still feel a disaster's impact.

On my way here, I kept hoping i could catch a glimpse of the disaster remains from the catastrophic flooding in Iowa and Wisconsin. The most i noticed were some crackled muddy areas that once were crops and a damaged barn or shed in Nebraska that i imagined (not necessarily accurately) was hit by a tornado. When i looked across the fields of Iowa and Nebraska, i imagined the weather, not serene and sunny as it was, but cloudy and ominous—the clouds a purple-green. I tried to transport myself to that feeling of no-escape, because there is no shelter, there's only continuous open space.

I felt disappointed in Iowa that most of the floodwaters in my purview had receded and traveled down the Mississippi, even though i heard on the radio of a town that was still coping, weeks later, with being underwater. Imagine the bugs. Imagine the smell—that rank, fermenting stench that i'd smell growing up in southeastern PA after a week straight of rain. I never paid attention then to whether the creeks and rivers in our area were overflowing.

But i'm captivated by disaster and compelled to want to see it—maybe like most people who try to catch the latest news until another disaster takes its place. Think of all the events this year: earthquake in China, Typhoon in Myanmar (?), tornadoes in the midwest, torrential rains and flooding in Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri. Then there are all of the man-made disasters like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the criminal election in Zimbabwe, the riots in Tibet and China and the hunting down of police officers in Juarez, Mexico. There are the disasters on the local scale that I assume the rest of the country knows about or should know about—the crashing of 2 news helicopters, the racial profiling by the county sheriff, serial shooters and serial rapists and the imminent downfall and collapse of the historic Icehouse as it becomes overwhelmed with debt and in need of repair.

The parallel i keep coming back to is that of personal disaster. My fascination and concern over disasters locally and across the world relates directly to my concern and feelings of lack of control over my own disaster—past and present. The initial events were years ago but i'm still dealing with the aftermath. There is no pamphlet for being 33 and dealing with the residual effects of emotional and physical abuse, neglect, and being made to feel a nuisance and worthless.

I know the work i'll do here will end up being about this. I was morbidly enthusiastic when i heard of the torrential rains affecting the exact location that i would be traveling to. I tracked the flooding levels on the National Weather Service website and New York Times, wondering if things could possibly get worse.

There's something about locating myself amongst a disaster to give my own some credence. To be able to witness a force that destroys or attempts to destroy that which seems so valuable, permanent and precious. But it never manages to completely obliterate it. There are pieces left, even if just in the memory, that is what causes everyone the most pain. As it says in the pamphlet as a resulting behavior or thought of a disaster: "Frequently replaying the events and circumstance of the disaster in your mind."

It's this proximity to almost death—to almost destruction, but continuance—knowing that at some point, it will end, leaving you no remnants of stress or pain because you, with it, will be gone.