Windy City

THE WINDY CITY

As we walked along the banks of Cazenovia Creek, the wind howled around us like a Banshee's wail. The water here is swift moving and clear. The vee, of tiny ripples, disturbed the surface only when flowing around the odd rock or obstruction in the stream bed. The leaves onshore whirled around us in miniature cyclonic eddies, like a special effect from the movies. It is Fall in Western New York. I pulled my coat tighter around me and leaned into the gale. It gets like this in Buffalo sometimes.

The winds, when they come, roar across the open expanse of Lake Erie with the force and fury of a rushing freight train. In times past, during some exceptionally heavy windstorms, I can remember seeing frail elderly people rolling along the downtown streets like tumble weeds. They try desperately to grasp onto light poles and mail boxes. The winds are strongest around City Hall, on Niagara Square. Sometimes, it can become necessary to run a rope line from City Hall, to the Turner Parking Ramp across the street. The grim employees cinch along the lifeline like victims caught in the flood of a raging river.

It is the sound that scares most people. With winds over 70 mph, the roar sounds like an angry lion. Huge Oak Trees sway from side to side in a frightful ballet. Anything not securely tied down is apt to fly away like Dorothy's house, in the Wizard of Oz.

The Lake water surges forward, in great frothy whitecaps, as it smashes into the offshore sea wall with pulverizing intensity. It isn't unusual to see the ten ton caprocks, that crown the offshore breakwall, unseated like so many mini bricks in a toy game. A derrick and crane must reseat them, in the Summer, when conditions are calmer.

Once, long ago in 1844, the winds created a " Seiche" that flooded much of the downtown waterfront area . A seiche is sort of like tilting a cereal bowl until the milk runs out of one side. Buffalo is on the "spilling side" of Lake Erie.

The scariest place to be, during these events, is on the elevated sections of the Skyway. Here, the wind smashes into a two thousand pound automobile with the force of a charging rhinoceros. If you don't hold onto the wheel, for all you are worth, you just might go up and over the retaining wall, for the 100 foot ride to the streets below. It is a daunting experience for the uninitiated. It really becomes interesting when a wall of sleet and snow accompanies the wind storm. Then, a gajillion horizontal slush balls pepper the vehicle like an angry version of a Space Invaders Video Game. It is during these moments, that you discover that there is a creator, or at least you hope that there is.

Afterwards, it is the quiet that startles one most. The lake waves are gentle and rhythmic. The birds waft upon the currents of air in a lazy and graceful minuet. The sun shines brightly and the sky is that dazzling azure blue that comes only after a rainstorm. It is a portrait of grace and tranquillity. You mentally shake your mind and wonder if the storm ever really happened at all.

The weather, in our neck of the woods, is a fickle great beast, with a will of its' own. It is like sleeping with a three thousand pound elephant, you become somewhat adept at anticipating its' need to toss and turn.

Joseph Xavier Martin