"Sandy, can't you see, [we're] in misery..."

When John Travolta sang about Sandy, he was stranded at the drive-in. I'm stranded at home without Ben, who is in NYC, but with extra water, propane, gas for our little generator and the company of Luna and a houseguest. I am not, like so many, in a displacement camp, or on a precarious hillside, or living on the bank of a river.

Port-au-Prince is wet and cold. It's been raining for more than 72 hours, and forecasted to continue to rain for at least the next day. Schools, businesses and the embassy are closed. Many towns and villages in Haiti's south are flooded, as are low-laying parts of Port-au-Prince. Sandy has caused landslides, bridges to wash out, and power outages. Rivers are surging their banks. Homes have collapsed. Fields of crops have been wiped out. So far, 16 people have lost their lives.

I know it's frivolous to compare this storm to the 1978 soundtrack of a teen's breaking heart, but we are all sitting and wondering why-y-y the rain won't stop.

This is the River Grise in Croix-des-Missions, on the northern edge of Port-au-Prince: