Over my 90 years, I have learned some things about hurricanes. 

ln 1944, just a couple of months before my 10th birthday, one came ashore near Brunswick, retained much of its power as it moved inland and blew the gable end off of the old house in which my family was living in Toombs County. I remember well our retreat by car through downed and threshing pines to the home of my paternal grandmother. We stayed there while Daddy and neighbors retrieved scattered pieces of our house from in the cotton patch and put it back together. By the next spring, we had a snug new house.

I have observed the destruction wrought by Gulf Coast hurricanes. Annette and I were among the spectators for Georgia Southern's "Hugo Bowl" and we later observed its damage from Charleston to many miles upstate.

However, I have never known a storm like Helene. Seventy miles wide and 500 miles long, it is being rated just below Katrina in destructiveness. Its winds and rain ravaged southern Georgia, destroying uncounted trees, structures and crops and gutting roads. The mountains of North Carolina, already saturated by earlier rain, sent unprecedented floods down their slopes, washing away towns, homes and businesses and killing people – 125 at last count – with many more missing.

I live in a pecan orchard near a heavily-wooded area. Trees and limbs fell like soldiers before machine guns. Streets were blocked. All services went out: power, cable TV, Frontier, which is my internet provider. Power was restored after nine days, VYVE after two weeks. Who knows if or when with Frontier? My friend and "caretaker," George Loper, has family in Savannah who escaped the destruction and a daughter brought gasoline-powered generators. He used one to run a power strip at my lift chair providing me with a light, a box fan and charging for my cell phone. Another ran my refrigerator. He also found help to remove downed trees and limbs from my yard.

When I was able to reach family and friends in Toombs and Montgomery counties by phone, I learned that their experiences were much like ours. I was greatly concerned about damage to the farm in Toombs, but learned that the big pecan tree near the house was uprooted but did not fall on the house. There was damage to a large utility building, which is being repaired at considerable cost.

Kathy Bradley, the superbly skillful and insightful columnist for the Herald, also experienced the storm at her house in the country. Her recent columns unfold things she learned during Helene and its aftermath. Unsurprisingly, they are revealing and uplifting.

My lesson from the storm is not so positive, possibly because of differences in circumstances in life. Without electricity elsewhere, I was mostly confined to my lift chair haven unless I transferred to the wheelchair for necessary movement elsewhere. At night, I had to guide my way with a flashlight. I did not sleep well. The bi-pap machine beside my bed lacked electricity. Since the other option for dealing with my sleep apnea is to recline at no more than a 45 degree angle, the lift chair was both haven and prison. Without electricity, I scrounged around for cold food. I stared at the same objects across the room by day and into darkness at night. For nine days and nights.

Vulnerability. That is the lesson that drummed into my reasoning again and again. My disabilities were more obvious and they drove home the realization of vulnerability. But for George and the generators that he tended and his regular visits, it would have been necessary for me to call 911 before my cell phone battery died.

Upon reflection, I now see that we all are vulnerable. We depend on electric power for everything from food preparation to the internet, traffic lights to surgery. Some cell towers were damaged and communications were spotty – still are in some places. I recall hearing repeated warnings that the power grid of this country is in serious need of repair and is highly vulnerable to terrorist destruction, perhaps by electronic device rather than physical destruction.

Since we cannot live without the technologies that define our world, we need to focus on actions to ensure their dependability. We cannot go back to the ways of coping that I knew decades ago. Where could we find mules and plows to grow corn or vegetables? Moreover, we have new problems. Nature is on a rampage – more and bigger storms, more and bigger fires, melting polar ice caps and glaciers. Ways to slow these changes, to combat them, to adapt to the coming world, must be found.

We are vulnerable, all of us. Terrible storms tell us so.