By Jefferson Weaver
When Cape Verde burps, we get indigestion.
I’m willing to bet most folks never heard of Cape Verde until the modern era of
weather forecasting; it’s a little spot off the African coast where everything comes
together and creates bad storms. It’s sent some significant events our way through
the years, considering how insignificant it is most of the time.
I am not going to bore and bewilder you with El Ninos and La Ninas and invests and
lows and highs and water temperatures today. We all know there’s a storm coming,
and it might come here, less than a year after the uninvited, drunken Florence
meandered around and messed with us. She came two years after Matthew’s misery.
There’s a storm coming, and there’s not a dang thing we can do to prevent it.
But there’s a whole lot we can do.
Our household began preparing last week; I saw plenty of other folks doing the
same this weekend, some with more emotion than necessary, some with an almost
party like enthusiasm. There were folks who were willing to wait their turns, and
others who would cut you for the last can of Vienna sausages.
I was talking with a friend Saturday, and she was distraught. Her community has
been hit repeatedly by floods, and she doesn’t know if she can handle it again. She
doesn’t know what she can do.
I tried to help her, and suggested she check on one person, then another. Helping
somebody else always makes me feel better.
I realized right then and there I needed to practice what I was preaching.
Another friend of mine, Greg Sibbett, took it one step farther about the same time.
He shared his suggestion that every single person contact ten others. He was more
worried about those who are in wheelchairs or have other disabilities, but he noted
that everybody needs a friend sometimes. It doesn’t take much – just a phone call, a
text, or even better, a visit. Considering the stores are about sold out of anything
anybody could possibly need this late in the game, and the television and internet
are in all apocalypse, all the time mode, it’s not like there’s anything else to do
except work.
So I want to ask you – who are the people in your ten? Is it the tired, harried single
mom working retail as people scream for more AA batteries and bottled water?
Maybe it’s the man caring for his aged mom. Maybe a coworker. Maybe a friend who
just can’t catch a break. Maybe it’s the policeman who patrols your neighborhood, or
the spouse of an LEO who worries every day that something bad will happen.
Maybe your ten includes your preacher; people don’t realize that carrying the load
of the flock can weigh down the shepherd and his family.
Maybe your ten includes the homeless man on the corner, the migrant family down
the road, the woman with the Downs’ Syndrome child or the widow who always
waves as you drive by her house.
There are more examples than I have space to suggest, and besides, if you have eyes
and are reading this, you can likely see someone who could benefit from a “How y’all
doin’?” call.
The people who study such say we humans are social animals; we require contact
with other humans to remain healthy. Some of us do better on our own for longer
periods than others, but when there’s a crisis, there’s an atavistic need to hear a
voice, or even just see another person, so we’re not alone.
I hope that by the time you read this, your family’s plan is put together. You know if
you’re going or staying and when. You have made provision for your pets. Your
home is secure as it can be. Somebody knows where you will be if and when Dorian
rolls through here like an unwanted in-law who needs beer money.
I want to ask you to follow my friend Greg’s lead, and choose your ten. Ask them to
find ten of their own. It doesn’t take much, and it’s better to hear a voice before a
storm than to try to identify it afterward.
Some of us lost homes and furniture and photographs and hope during Matthew and
Florence. Some of us regained new hope when others stepped up for even the little
things. Sadly, some of us are still hurting horribly from the past hurricanes. Some of
us came through both unscathed.
All of us can help somebody.
Pick your ten. Touch base with them. Have a word of prayer, or share a cold drink.
Crack a joke. Make plans to help each other in case something bad happens. Make
plans to help someone else if something good happens.
Cape Verde burped, and we got indigestion.
But there’s no upset stomach that can defeat Southeastern North Carolina.
We’ve been there, done that and the t-shirt is old and faded now.
We’ve got this.
Find your ten.
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