Last night, the town where my parents live (Salem, NJ) made an incredibly HUGE mistake. They had issued an emergency evacuation due to an issue at the power plant in the town. It was meant to be a test, but some moron issued it as an actual emergency broadcast which showed up on everyone’s television and computers in the town reading “A CIVIL AUTHORITY HAS ISSUED A NUCLEAR POWER PLANT WARNING FOR THE FOLLOWING COUNTIES: CUMBERLAND, SALEM.” My mother said she was confused at first. She yelled to my sister, who is now living with them, in the other room asking her if she saw what was on the television. My sister was watching a movie at the time, so when she turned it off and went to cable, nothing would come on except for the emergency broadcast, in which my sister yelled to my mom telling her that is was saying to evacuate immediately, and that it was not a test. My father wasn’t home at the time. He was with one of his friends at their house. When my mother called him freaking out, my mom said my dad was laughing because he assumed she read it wrong (she does tend to overreact). However, when he turned on the television and saw the alert, he screamed at my mother to grab their two cats and to be outside with my sister when he gets there and that they were heading North towards my brother and I.
When they hung up, my mother started panicking. All she kept thinking was that there was a possibility of a nuclear power plant explosion. She couldn’t even think straight. She was crying and running all over the house trying to grab things she needed. She panicked so much that she put three shirts on, one on top of the other. She grabbed cat food and cat litter, her blood pressure pills, some other little things, and then she said she ran into her bedroom and grabbed all the family photos she had and cards that my brother and I had wrote to her. My sister remained calm and was scrambling to try and find the cats. Both of their hearts were racing and they couldn’t find one of the cats, but they weren’t leaving without it. My sister didn’t grab a thing, she just ran all over trying to find the cat. When my dad finally arrived, he started yelling at my mom for not being outside. My sister yelled at him to stop yelling at my mother and that they were trying to find the one cat. My mom had tried calling the police station several times, but no one answered. She was calling the non-emergency line because she wasn’t thinking straight. Finally, my sister called 911, in which they said it was an error and that it was only supposed to be a test.
I know this might be something random to write about, but when my mom told me today what had happened and the steps they all took, I couldn’t help but smile for several reasons. My father, who my mother always swears would leave her in an emergency, sped to the house. The only things he demanded she grab were the two cats. Not his guitar which he had grown to love. Not his clothes. Nothing materialistic, just my mother, my sister, and the cats. My mother, who knowing her was just running around in circles to find the cats, paused and realized there were some things she couldn’t imagine parting with: Family photos and cards that my brother and I had written to her. And finally, my sister. I want to point out that my sister and I have a strained relationship. We haven’t spoken in years, but when my mom told me how she was during everything, I started to feel a little differently. My sister, even though her heart was pounding and she wanted to cry or freak out, remained calm for my mother. She didn’t grab a single one of her belongings. All she did was help my mother find the cats.
Although this was all an error and no one was actually in danger, at the time everyone in the town thought there was an emergency evacuation. And while my family is broken in some ways, when it came to a possible emergency, the only things they thought to grab were each other, and of course the cats. And for that reason, when my mother was telling me this story today, all I could do was smile.
