A week after Charley: "We're just a short drive from normalcy."

[madfloridian]

This is the worst part of it. Many of us now have life back as normal, while just 15 miles east of us they are devastated still. There have been articles in our paper more and more about a kind of depression setting in. One family in Lake Wales spoke of it, no power, no money, no gas to go anywhere, job gone now, the heat.

This columnist lives in Lake Wales, which is very hard hit still.
http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040821/COLUMNISTS0501/408210337/1106/NEWS

SNIP..."We're only a short drive from normalcy, where people talk of golf games and fishing and how Charley was not all that bad.

But most people who do not live in the parts of southern and eastern Polk County that felt the wrath of that hurricane a week ago do not have a clue.

I am enraged by the comparisons already being made between Andrew and Charley..hurricanes are personal and a matter of perspective. The perspective from the center of one is something to behold. If you have any doubt about that, you have not experienced a hurricane.

We got walloped. And a week after that storm, there are very few people around who would claim to be genuinely healthy. If it is not fatigue, it is depression. Or it's both.

I watched an elderly man Wednesday as he attempted to cross Scenic Highway. He pushed the button on the pole beside the crosswalk, looked skyward over the intersection and then pushed it again....he was waiting for a traffic light that no longer existed. And that seemed perfectly logical..."END SNIP

[Gin]

1. I have a friend who works for Geico and hes in Orlando....and will be

moving further south...says what he has seen is awful a bit south of Orlando but knows the real devastation is futher south...and that some areas have not been cleared and the NG are in therese areas now.. so no traffic allowed and no phones or services...this makes me wonder if the death toll is much higher...that article about the 400+deaths made me wonder about the truth.

its so sad to see the depression on these people who have lost everything in their later years...also on the younger ones.

[medeak]

2. heard from a friend

in Palm Beach that 42 patients were transferred to her mother's nursing home from Punta Gorda.

It's a nightmare...not enough staff to even feed the patients. She's been there nonstop doing what she can.

Said relatives are making 300 mile commute and going back home to another nightmare of no water or power.

The media isn't covering this....there must be so many stories ...

[demgrrrll]

3. Normalcy wasn't a word in common usage until the Hoover campaign

used "a Return to Normalcy" as part of their campaign rhetoric. I would have searched for another word.

[madfloridian]

5. Knowing Bill Bair, I doubt he even thought about it.

I never heard of that slogan, and it does not bother me. It so well describes what life is like in Central Florida. I see no problem with the word normalcy at all.

[KoKo]

4. I was checking the "Orlando Sentinal" today trying to find "human interest

reports about what's going on in the aftermath, and the tone of the articles was all about "things are moving along faster than with Andrew in the clean up and restoration of services...and fewer people are without power....,etc. etc. Lots of "happy stories" about folks getting their air-conditioning and TV's back on and smiling and waving at the power company linesmen in gratitude.

While "happy stories" are important, there must be alot of stories about folks who are dealing with more than their power at this point.

It seemed the coverage was much less than in the first days after Charley...making it seem that all was getting back to normal.

I have friends in Winter Park still without power and their waterlines were broken when the trees uprooted bringing up the lines with them. They were told to boil water when they didn't have electricity to do it and they didn't think to stock up on bottled water before the storm because they had never had any threat of hurricanes in Winter Park. There must be tons of folks who maybe didn't even have water to boil, and if they had it couldn't boil it, and didn't have any water in the house or any way to get it because they couldn't get out of their streets because of the downed trees. And, that's suburban Winter Park a very upscale community. I cannot imagine how dreadful it is for those folks in the heat and bug infested areas which must look like a war zone with moldering furniture and rotting food lying around, where they have no help and a place to bury the stuff so it doesn't attract insects and disease. How are they living in the terrible heat and with little in the way of shelter. What if they can't get to the places where they hand out the food, water and ice? What about their medications and their SS checks?

There's very little coverage on the cables, except Punta Gorda and even then it's happy talk about "recovery."

[madfloridian]

6. Only on local TV will you hear the untidy side of the story.

And our Ledger is doing a pretty good job on it.
www.theledger.com

Yes, I have seen a lot of smiles and happy people meme. Guess what, many are not that happy. You are so right.

[madfloridian]

7. This city just had a huge storm which knocked out electric again.

The reporters could not even get a live feed. Huge storm. With all the leaky roofs it just makes things worse.