Good-bye (for now) Tala

Yesterday we left West Hartford and said good-bye to our (almost) 6 month old granddaughter. We hadn't planned to leave yesterday; we had planned to leave early this morning to have one more evening with her and one more dinner with Kiel and Carly. Like the rest of this adventure our plans turned out to be only tentative. Big lesson learned on this trip.

On Tuesday Kiel and Carly told us to bring things over to the house in case we needed to spend the night because of the tropical storm that might be coming through Connecticut. I have been in a tropical storm once when I was 12 years old in the Philippines visiting family. It makes sense that a tropical storm would hit the Philippine Islands, but Connecticut? So we dutifully brought our jammies and showed up at the house at our usual 10:00 time in the morning. The sky was gray but it was still very hot and humid. At about 2:00 the storm hit with heavy winds. We were sitting in the screened in porch area when Carly said "let's get out of here in case that tree falls." No sooner were the words out of her mouth when a giant branch snapped off from the tree. We all huddled in the living room, Thomas looking out the window and commenting on the 45 degree angle rain pouring down. At 3:00, about the time I would put Tala down for her nap, we had an emergency warning on our phones. "Tornado warning in West Hartford CT. Shelter in an inside room or basement until 3:45." Down to the basement we all went.

Luckily no tornado formed from the high winds, but we were schooled nonetheless about storms on the East Coast. The power went out at 5:00. We had a candlelight dinner (luckily Kiel and Carly have a gas range and a gas water heater) and then we went back to our hotel. The number of emergency vehicles and trees downed on the short drive to our hotel was astonishing to us. Our hotel had no power as well so I read by iPhone light (like the olden days) and Thomas just went right to sleep. We plugged in all of our devices so that when the power came back on during the night, we would be set.

By now you have figured out the ending to this story. When we left West Hartford yesterday at 5:00 p.m., the power had not been restored. In fact we were told it would be 2-10 days before power was restored. When there is no power many of our creature comforts are compromised but one that I had not even realized was necessary became essential - air conditioning in the 90+ degree weather with 70% humidity. Sadly, so that we could actually sleep at night, we left 14 hours early to enjoy Nate and Hilary's air conditioned home and get Nessie ready for her trip home to California. BTW...Kiel, Carly and Tala also find this creature comfort essential and rented an Airbnb in another state with air conditioning.

The real story in this blog post is not the adventure of the storm but how hard it was to say good-bye. I remember when my children went off to college and that was hard. Then they would come home to visit and leave again. Every time they left or we left them it was hard all over again. This time when we left...well, you get it. Seeing our son and daughter-in-law as parents was an extraordinary experience. Having two weeks of spending everyday with our granddaughter was a gift that they gave us. In those two weeks we got to know her patterns; what makes her laugh, how she lets us know she is hungry or tired, when she is playful, what makes her curious. We saw both our children as babies in her and we were transported back to both the hard labor of those days and the intense pleasure of watching their development. And when we walked in the door and she smiled at us each morning...

Love. Our cup runneth over.

(Our blog post will continue tomorrow with a daily post of our trip back to California. We are taking our time and I am promised there will be many more photos along the way)