In Like A Lion

I was always hoping for snow. Lots of the white stuff so I could have another precious day off from school. We got a few storms in February, and I was able to go sledding down Chestnut Hhill, but we didn't have many snow days. It was the beginning of March, and we began to think of spring and warmer weather.
"Just one more snow would be nice," I thought.
A big enough storm to cancel school for a day so I could sled and build a snow fort and read Fantastic Four comic books all afternoon.
The weather man was saying there was some snow coming our way, possibly on March 6th, and it could be a big one.
Little did we know how big it would really be.
Several storm fronts came together that week, and the east coast would be pounded by wind and rain and snow and the sea.
It started out as rain and wind in Woodbury Heights that Tuedsday, March 6th, but quickly changed over to snow. The wind howled over thirty miles an hour and pounded our little house without mercy. It snowed on into Wednesday as well, and the winds picked up even more, and everything was covered in a dense blanket of snow and freezing rain.
We saw on the news how the Jersey shore was taking a terrible beating. They were getting rain down there, but the winds and the high tides were tearing down houses and the boardwalks. Tiny communities like Sea Isle City and Strathmere had to be evacuated; peoples' houses were smashed by the wind and some were even carried out to sea, bobbing on the waves. The boardwalk in Atlantic City was being shredded in spots, and even the famous Steel Pier was damaged by it all. A navy destroyer, the USS Monssen, was sent aground on Long Beach Island; everywhere along the shore there were scenes of horrible destruction.
We had to leave our house as well. The snow and freezing rain had covered the power lines, and trees had fallen over and knocked the wires down too. We had no electricity, so there was no heat, so Mom and Carl and I went to Nanny and Pop-Pop's house where the coal-fired furnace would protect us from the cold. Dad would stay behind with Whee-Zee, keeping warm as best they could, guarding the house and making sure the pipes didn't freeze.
This was more than I bargained for. There wouldn't be any sledding or snowball fights in this weather, you couldn't move in all the ice and snow, and you felt bad for all those people who lost their homes down the shore.
We stayed at Nanny's house for two or three days. It snowed a little more and then it rained and then the sun began to shine, and things began to move. It got warmer, so there was fog and melting snow, and everything was one big mess.
I got my wish, there wasn't any school for a couple of days, but I couldn't enjoy it; I wasn't in my house with my dog and all my stuff, and it seemed like the world had been turned upside down and inside out.
It was a frightening five days, and for many other people in South Jersey and Virginia and North Carolina and towns all along the east coast it was a most terrible time indeed. Houses smashed, lives shattered, loved ones killed. It would be remembered as The Great Atlantic Storm, or the Ash Wednesday Storm, and it wouldn't be forgotten by those who lived through it.
I saw the destruction on the evening news and I was grateful that I didn't live down the shore.
I'd been cold and I'd been scared, but I knew I was one of the lucky ones.
I was going home.