Hurricane Hugo – 36 years ago… I remember watching Leslie Lyles (newscaster in Charleston, SC at the time) saying “GET OUT, GET OUT NOW!” In reality, it was too late. Shortly after she said that the power went out. It was a harrowing night to say the least. My sister and I moved to the hallway, no windows or glass to break. Bedroom doors closed, (and we moved a large piece of furniture in front of a window) yet the sound was like we didn’t even have windows. It was so loud. My hair blew like I was outside from the wind coming from underneath the door. We didn’t drink, but that night we split a small Michelob and both fell asleep, woke at 9AM to the sound of saws. We pulled back the plastic, and looked outside. OHMYGOSH. What we thought were branches snapping one after another were actually large pine trees. The split a few homes, the weight of a soaking wet and extremely large pine tree is enormous. We were so fortunate. So, so thankful.
I remember every one of these images of Rob Fowler’s. Having just moved to Summerville, SC I was working a lot (and remember we didn’t have cell phones) and I didn’t pay attention to the fact there was a storm coming until the day before. I went to work that morning – against the traffic heading out. I worked until the weather really started to deteriorate a little before noon. The two of us who showed up to work covered all computer equipment in plastic and moved them to high ground. I jumped in my car and tried to get home (it was most bizarre being the only one going towards what was likely to be a disaster instead of away from it). My sister and I rode out the storm (brilliant, I know – but…) no power, no water for quite some time. Trees down everywhere. Powerlines down almost everywhere, gas station roofs on their side, boats in the road in Charleston. We had to go with what we heard regarding Charleston “the Market area had been leveled” and so many rumors like that (not true). Oh, it was bad, but it made us all stronger as a community.
When we got past the shock of what we had seen we pulled out our charcoal grill to make coffee (NEEDED coffee!). Neither of us had ever used a charcoal grill before) – I didn’t wait long enough for the charcoal to heat, resulting in coffee that tasted like lighter fluid. 🤦♀️…