My cousin, Shawnique Ford Richter and me a week before Hurricane Sandy with glasses that belonged to our great, great-grandmother, Tempy Burton and our great grandmother, Josephine Ford.

I’m happy this Friday not to be following any storms like Hurricane Sandy or the subsequent Nor’easter that dropped about a half a foot of snow on our town, up to two feet in other areas.

I’d always wondered how my New Orleans relatives could put up with all of the Hurricanes sweeping in from the Gulf like clockwork every summer.  ”Why don’t they move somewhere above sea level,” I always wondered.  But look what good being above sea level did for us here in New Jersey.  I lost power for five days which is lucky compared to my compatriots.  Rockaway Beach in New York looks like a war zone and parts of the Jersey shore have been swallowed by the Atlantic.

Things are just starting to get back to normal here as my daughters have returned to school after missing a week and a half due to the storm and train service in our town resumed today after being suspended the past few weeks.

The only thing working for us during the power outtage was my cell phone (when I could get it charged).  I got lots of emails and text messages from friends and family checking up on me including genealogy buddies, my New Orleans cousin, Shawnique, and my linked descendants,  people who I am connected with through slavery.

Just before the storm hit, I traveled to see the latter two in Louisiana and Mississippi. Shawnique and I reminisced about her dad who just passed away in October and we marveled at our family history that he had passed on to us.  I got to have lunch with the sister of one of my genealogy buddies who worked just miles from my grandfather’s resting place where I also went to pay my respects.  After my aunt gave me a special prayer and blessing for a safe journey, I left New Orleans and continued to Canton, Mississippi for a family gathering with my linked descendants. (But not before I bought some beignets from Cafe du Monde). In the perfect bookend to that trip, I came home the following day and spoke at my town’s historical society about what I’d learned about researching African American genealogy by tracing my own roots these past few years.

Then the storm hit.

During those five days without power, oddly, I felt at peace.  Spending so much uninterrupted time with my family, when we weren’t all getting on each other’s nerves, I noticed how they all are thriving.  My daughters have inherited my husband’s sense of humor and compassion, all of them packing up stuff to give storm victims even while we were still powerless. In our community, people dug each other out of broken tree branches and offered each other a spot around their living room fire if that’s the only thing they had to share.  Through the sometimes stormy trek through  my ancestors’ history these past few years, I gained a fantastic relationship with my cousin Monique, and a budding one with my linked descendants. Maybe the calm feeling was just because power was the only thing we lost – no property damage like last year when Irene came.  That hurricane wrecked my grandma’s car which was in our driveway and a lot of our personal belongings that were in a storage facility at the time that got flooded. But I prefer to think this calm after the storm is a Sankofa thing.  Looking back at my past has put me at peace about my present and where I’m going.

My family and me at the Montclair Historical Society after my talk on African American genealogy. Photo courtesy of Tony Turner.